Seriously, if our society thought it fine to sanction same-sex love, did we really not expect that incestuous love would be far away? In the meantime there are those who want to hang out Judge Neilson to dry, and sanctimoniously preach to the rest of us about what an authentic sexual relationship should look like. Bernard Toutounji writes at www.foolishwisdom.com

The ennobling gift. 'I counsel you ...' (Rev. 3:18). Perhaps we could first observe that fact that we have a God who is content to give advice to his creatures. I can never read this verse without being strangely moved. He is the great God of the expanding universe. He has countless galaxies of stars at his fingertips. The heaven and the heaven of heavens cannot contain him. He is the Creator and sustainer of all things, the Lord God Almighty. He has the right to issue orders for us to obey. He prefers to give advice which we need not heed. He could command; he chooses to counsel. He respects the freedom with which he had ennobled us. --- John R.W. Stott

Dear Brothers and Sisters
www.virtueonline.org
July 25, 2014

Jeremy Bonner, writing on the courtroom drama taking place in St. George, South Carolina between the Diocese of South Carolina and the Episcopal Church and its rump diocese noted, “After two weeks in Charleston and five days sitting in the St. George courthouse, this week’s bravura performance by Gettysburg College's Allen Guelzo was one of the most lucid pieces of witness testimony of the whole trial.

“Beginning with the review of an eighteenth century Act of Parliament acknowledging the Moravians as a ‘Protestant Episcopal’ church, Diocese of South Carolina attorney Alan Runyan pressed on to explore the autonomous character of the state associations of colonial churches that existed after the American Revolution, discussed the notion of subsidiarity as expressed in William White’s initial proposals for the organization of a national church, and examined the nature of diocesan independence as experienced by South Carolina Episcopalians between 1861 and 1865.

“In passing, the court heard the public reading of various extracts from Powel Dawley’s The Episcopal Church and Its Work, published in 1955 as part of the Church’s Teaching Series (and which Bishop Mark Lawrence used while training to be a lay reader in The Episcopal Church in the 1970s), many of which are noteworthy for their lamentation about the decentralized character of the national church, almost forty years after the establishment of the National Council (later the Executive Council).

“Both Mary Kostel and David Booth Beers did their best with a witness for whom they were unprepared (this is permitted under South Carolina law, as Guelzo was introduced for the purpose of rebuttal of their earlier argument pertaining to the manner in which the national church exercised control over dioceses and states). Kostel focused on the writings of nineteenth century commentators that have been at the center of my counterpart Robert Bruce Mullin’s arguments, but Guelzo fought back, in the process eliciting from the judge the revelation that state law requires that an expert witness have the freedom to offer a critique of a proffered document if he declines to accept it as ‘learned treatise’ (something which came as news to a number of the South Carolina attorneys present for the independent Diocese).

“Freed from a simple acknowledgment of the statements presented, Guelzo happily explained how most of the advocates of national church hierarchy in the nineteenth century were ritualist partisans and certainly enjoyed no authority from the General Convention to say what they said. Asked for a counter argument from the same era, he proffered Calvin Colton’s Genius and Mission of the Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States (1853), a source of which, I must confess, I was unaware, but which I’ve no doubt fits the bill. The point at issue is that any notion of a churchwide consensus on polity is simply unsustainable. There followed a fruitless set of exchanges between Guelzo and David Beers in which the latter was in fairly short order outmaneuvered, when he attempted to switch the focus to twentieth century canon law, of which Guelzo did not profess to be an expert.

“So the final historical verdict on the Diocese of South Carolina is delivered by the premier historian of the Reformed Episcopal Church, who after serving for many years as an REC priest was received into the then Episcopal Diocese of Quincy in 2000 and now assists in the Diocese of Pennsylvania, whose Provisional Bishop, Clifton Daniel, gave testimony on behalf of the national church earlier in these proceedings!”

The trial ended this week with the testimony of Bishop Mark Lawrence which we will post at www.virtueonline.org as soon as it becomes available. This has been an historic trial involving tens of millions of dollars worth of property. There is every likelihood that Bishop Lawrence’s version of events will prevail and he will get to keep the majority of the diocese in his possession with his diocese firmly under the Global South Primates. There will, of course, be an appeal by the National Church, but that too should not reverse what happened this week in St. George. Then it will, in all likelihood, go on to the Supreme Court of the United States. I have posted the day by day trial with VOL’s own correspondent Ladson F. Mills III in the court covering the trial and from other sources, as well. Stay tuned.

*****

In the midst of the trial, the bishop of the faux rump diocese of South Carolina, Charles vonRosenberg announced that he would allow his priests to permission to bless same-sex couples in committed relationships. The decision follows the May decision by Bishop Andrew Waldo, who heads the Episcopal Diocese of Upper South Carolina.

Like Waldo, vonRosenberg made it clear that priests are not required to perform the rite, which was approved at the 2012 general convention of The Episcopal Church.

On July 22, TEC and vonRosenberg’s diocese joined with two major U.S. religious denominations and filed an amicus brief in support of Episcopalians in Fort Worth, Texas, petitioning the U.S. Supreme Court to hear a case that could affect the ultimate resolution of their lawsuit filed in South Carolina.

The Presbyterian Church (USA) and the Methodist Church joined TECSC as amici curiae, or “friends of the court,” in the brief filed July 21. Amicus briefs are filed by those who are not parties to an appeal, but have a strong interest in the subject matter. The purpose is to advise the Supreme Court of relevant additional information or arguments the court may wish to consider.

The question presented in the amicus brief is whether the Free Exercise Clause of the First Amendment requires courts, resolving a property dispute within a hierarchical church, to give legal effect to a pre-existing trust provision in the church’s canons.

“This Court should grant review to resolve the deep division among the state courts regarding the scope of its holding in Jones v. Wolf (1979)... to restore the First Amendment right of churches and their members to establish hierarchical polities, and to protect valuable church property from dissident members through appropriate trust provisions that reflect their hierarchical organization,” according to the brief.

The Episcopal Diocese of Fort Worth suffered a schism in 2008 similar to the one that occurred in South Carolina in 2012. The local split is the subject of an ongoing trial in state court in St. George, SC. In both cases, church leaders left The Episcopal Church over theological disputes while claiming to take property, names and assets with them.

In the Fort Worth case, parties loyal to the Episcopal Church had won summary judgments from the trial courts. But on appeal, the Texas Supreme Court ruled in favor of “neutral principles” in church property disputes rather than a “deference test” to canon law in a hierarchical church. The Texas ruling also held that The Episcopal Church’s Dennis Canon, a trust canon enacted at the U.S. Supreme Court’s instruction in 1979, couldn’t be enforced under Texas law.

According to the amicus brief, the case is of particular interest to The Episcopal Church in South Carolina because of the current lawsuit filed against local Episcopalians “that seeks to subvert the hierarchical structure of The Episcopal Church.

“The South Carolina trial court has expressed an intention to apply the neutral principles approach ... even though the dispute between the parties includes an explicit attack on the very structure of the Church and its authority to designate its bishops. As such, the experience of The Episcopal Church in South Carolina may aid the [Supreme] Court’s consideration of the risks presented by an unduly invasive application of neutral principles to disputes with dissident factions of hierarchical churches,” the brief says.

*****

The Illinois Fourth District Appellate Court in Springfield has ruled in favor of the Diocese of Quincy in litigation with the Episcopal Church. Three judges of the appellate panel unanimously upheld Judge Thomas Ortbal of the Trial Court in Adams County, Ill. in his Sept. 2, 2013 decision in favor of the Anglican Diocese. The Episcopal Church, having lost the 2013 trial, appealed the decision to the Appellate Court.

The suit centered on the western Illinois diocese's decision, in November 2008, to end its affiliation with the Episcopal Church due to theological differences centering on the person of Jesus Christ and the fundamental authority of Holy Scripture.

Lawyers for the Episcopal Church argued in front of Judge Ortbal that Quincy did not have the right to sever ties with the national church, and that the diocese's money, endowments and property of parishes and missions belonged to the Episcopal Church. Judge Ortbal rejected that argument in finding for Quincy in the 2013 trial.

The Appellate judges affirmed the Episcopal Church is not a hierarchical church, with property held in common under the umbrella of a national church. The Appellate panel upheld the ruling that the diocese is the highest governing authority.

Central to the Appellate court decision was their affirmation that “Illinois courts have adopted the neutral-principles approach, whereby a court may objectively examine pertinent church characteristics, constitutions and bylaws, deeds, state statutes, and other evidence to resolve the matter as it would a secular dispute.”

“We have left God in charge of our defence in the litigation brought against us – we have simply prayed, carried out the work of the Kingdom, and tried to be faithful to our calling,” said the Rt. Rev. J. Alberto Morales, OSB, the Anglican Bishop. “We are so grateful for God's protection, for the work of the judges in ruling in our favor, and for the tireless work of our gifted legal team.”

*****

Two Anglican blogs, anxious to make the Global South look like idiots and hoping they will fall into line with Western views on sex and women’s ordination, got their backsides kicked this week when they loudly proclaimed that the very evangelical Anglican Province of Kenya had rolled over and would ordain women bishops. Not so fast.

The Anglican Archbishop of Kenya, the Most Rev. Eliud Wabukala issued a statement on women bishops in his province refuting claims by the Anglican Communion News Service and Anglican Ink that his province will ordain women to the episcopacy.

In a letter to his fellow bishops, Archbishop Wabukala wrote (following the Church of England resolve to consecrate women to the episcopacy), “I hereby state the following; According to the Article VI of our Constitution ON THE MINISTRY; Clause 4 and 5, there is a clear demarcation between the work of a Bishop and that of a Priest. In clause 4, the Bishop is referred to exclusively as male while in Clause 5, which deals with priests, the constitution recognizes that the holder of such office could be male or female.

“The ACK constitution does not address itself to the issue of consecration of lady bishops and shall do so at the appropriate time…in the meantime, the status quo remains until the Provincial Synod reviews the position.”

*****

Evangelicals and other Christians worldwide mourned the sudden death of a bishop in a breakaway Anglican church who had become a close personal friend of Pope Francis.

British-born Tony Palmer died in a hospital following hours of surgery after a motorcycle accident in the UK. He moved with his family to South Africa when he was ten, but was currently living with his wife Emiliana and two children in Trowbridge, Wiltshire. He was a bishop with the Communion of Evangelical Episcopal Churches, which embrace the middle ground of Anglican identity.

In January this year, Pope Francis sent Bishop Palmer to a charismatic conference hosted by television evangelist Kenneth Copeland, where he unveiled a video message of unity and love as the Pope had suggested.

*****

A group of Evangelical Episcopalians meeting under the banner of “Evangelion: Proclaiming the Gospel in TEC” will hold a conference for Evangelicals in the Episcopal Church in 2015. Interested parties are encouraged to fill out the contact form found at their website: http://evangeliontec.weebly.com
VOL will attend and cover this event.

*****

In the meantime, the Task Force to Reimagine the Episcopal Church (TREC) will convene a church wide meeting on October 2 at 7:30 pm Eastern time (6:30 pm Central/5:30 pm Mountain/4:30 pm Pacific/3:30 pm Alaska/1:30 pm Hawaii) as directed in its enabling resolution C095 approved by the 77th General Convention in 2012, The purpose of the meeting is “to receive responses to the proposed recommendations to be brought forward to the 78th General Convention.”

One hopes that one of the responses might be to actually (gulp) reintroduce the Episcopal Church to the “faith once for all delivered to the saints” and the gospel of redemption and grace that goes with it. If TEC keeps capitulating to the culture on faith (by dumbing down doctrines) and morals (by caving into the sexuality preference), don’t look for any substantive changes that will turn the church around. It’s not going to happen. It’s all about the message. TEC doesn’t have one apart from capitulating to the latest cultural nonsense, thereby committing its own form of spiritual and ecclesiastical genocide.

The meeting will be webcast live from Washington National Cathedral. Although the meeting will be open to the entire church, TREC encourages attendance from each diocese: a bishop, a lay deputy, a clerical deputy, and one person under the age of 35. TREC's final report to General Convention is due by November 30 for the 78th General Convention in Salt Lake City, Utah in July 2015.

*****

Anglican ups and downs. The Average Sunday Attendance at ACNA churches has increased 16% over 5 years (2009-2014).

The Average Sunday Attendance at Anglican Church of Canada churches has decreased by 12.5% over 6 years (2001-2007). The ASA at TEC churches decreased 6% over 3 years (2009-2012)

Is there a message here? Yes.

Will the ACoC and TEC listen - they keep telling us they love to listen - to it? No.

*****

Holy Redeemer Anglican Church of Montrose, VA, has purchased the historic Grant Methodist Church, a church dating from 1823. Holy Redeemer has been renting the church for Sunday services for the past several years. Holy Redeemer is a parish of the Anglican Church of Virginia. A consecration service was held at the church on June 21st, presided over by the Rt. Rev Larry W. Johnson, Bishop of ACOVA and Archbishop of the Anglican Church International Communion. The rector of Holy Redeemer, Rev Dr. W.R. Gardiner states that the church will remain a traditional church using the King James Bible and the 1928 Book of Common Prayer. Holy Redeemer pastors two mission churches, a chapel, and a prison ministry.

*****

The College of the Transfiguration in Grahamstown, Eastern Cape Province, South Africa, has invited an openly lesbian Episcopal seminary professor from the US Episcopal Church to preach and celebrate the Eucharist at their annual diocesan convocation even though the Anglican Church of Southern Africa “officially” does not allow non-celibate gay clergy, gay marriages, or even the blessing of same-sex relationships.

“I was stunned and shocked to learn this,” a former priest has told VOL. This same priest was unlicensed out of the Anglican Church because of his opposition to the liberalization of the province in matters of faith and morals.

The priest and professor in question is the Rev. Prof. Ruthanna Hooke, Homiletics Professor at Virginia Theological Seminary, based in Alexandria, Virginia. Her partner is Judy Adkins. She was invited by The Rev. Canon N Barney Pityana GCOB, rector who issued the invitation to all clergy in Grahamstown and Port Elizabeth Dioceses and to the Alumni of the College of the Transfiguration, Women in Ministry.

“This invitation goes against the canons and constitution of this province and violates the clear teaching of Scripture that God created male and female and then closed the sexual matrix,” the priest told VOL.

You can read the full story in today’s digest.

Two priests in the diocese pushed back. The Rev. Dave Doveton (Rector, Parishes of St Barnabas and St Philip; Anglican Dean of Studies, Stellenbosch Theological Institute) and The Very Rev. Dudley Greenshields (Dean) wrote a letter to Archbishop Makgoba expressing shock and disappointment at the invitation. They said she is a “false teacher.” “Ms Hooke, according to her bio published on the VTS website, believes in the ‘importance of engaging and training the preacher’s body and voice so as to foster a fuller embodiment of the Word proclaimed’ in other words a sacramental understanding of preaching.

What sacrament or sign does she embody? If she is in an active homosexual relationship, she truly is a sign, according to St Paul. She is embodying an idolatrous sign. Lesbianism is the sacrament of pagan idolatry (even Alain de Benoist the self-identifying pagan philosopher agrees with what is a mainstream Christian belief). What blasphemy is being permitted to take place in the sanctuary of our provincial theological college? You can read the full letter in today’s digest.

Clergy attendees were also invited to A Day with Prof. Ruthana Hooke – Women in Ministry “Bring-and-Braai” at Belvoir Farm, Sunland, Addo.

The College of the Transfiguration, Grahamstown, bills itself as a provincial center for the training of Anglican clergy.

For the record, VOL learned that Primate Makgoba was visiting US Episcopal Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori in New York this past week, undoubtedly with his hand out.

****

Religious groups will not receive an exemption from an executive order signed this morning by President Barack Obama banning “discrimination” based on sexual orientation or “gender identity” by federal contractors.

The order adds sexual orientation and gender identity to the list of specially protected categories that apply to federal contractors. It also adds gender identity to sexual orientation as a protected category for federal employees. The order could institutionalize federal discrimination against all religious groups and persons affirming natural marriage, traditional sexual ethics and the biological reality of gender.

A June letter, sent following the U.S. Supreme Court’s Hobby Lobby-Conestoga Wood decision, requested that the President include explicit religious freedom protections in any executive order regarding LGBTQ employees of federal contractors.

The letter, which was organized by Institutional Religious Freedom Alliance President Stanley Carlson-Thies, was signed by religious leaders including National Association of Evangelicals President Leith Anderson, Union of Orthodox Jewish Congregations of America Executive Director for Public Policy Nathan Diament, National Christian Hispanic Leadership Conference President Samuel Rodriguez, and Obama Spiritual Advisor Pastor Joel C. Hunter.

Officials from World Relief, World Vision, World Concern, Food for the Hungry and Samaritan’s Purse are signatories, along with numerous Christian Colleges and Universities. Several denominational leaders also signed, including officials from the Assemblies of God, the Seventh-Day Adventists, Wesleyan Church, Presbyterian Church in America, Church of the Nazarene, Christian & Missionary Alliance and others.

IRD President Mark Tooley commented: “President Obama’s new executive order compelling all federal contractors to affirm the latest LGBTQ orthodoxy escalates the ongoing culture war against traditional mores and religion.”

*****

Another vicar leaves the Anglican Church of New Zealand. A second Anglican vicar has departed over the church’s decision to bless same-sex couples.

The church's obsession with homosexuality has seen yet another Anglican pastor break camp and lead his flock into the religious wilderness to find a new home in the city.

The Rev. Michael Hewat, vicar of West Hamilton Anglican Parish near Auckland, NZ, is the second high profile Anglican leader to leave the Anglican Church in opposition to Motion 30 - a national declaration by the governing body to bless same sex relationships.

In a letter to the Waikato Times, he observed that homosexuality has dominated the church's agenda for two decades and "it amounts to an obsession."

His refusal to submit to a General Synod motion passed in May that aimed to recognize same-sex relationships means a forfeiture of his license to practice as an Anglican pastor.

In May, former Auckland pastor Charlie Hughes walked away with his congregation; Hewat believes more would come.

In a letter to the Waikato Bishop, the Rev Dr. Helen-Ann Hartley, and the Bishop of Taranaki, Rev Phillip Richardson, Hewat said Motion 30 would "prove to be a disaster" to church unity and by 2016 "the flood gates will open".

He will surrender his license Friday, July 25 - a move he called a formality - and will vacate church property.

A special general meeting was held earlier in the month where he received 94 per cent support from parishioners; a further postal vote brought that figure to greater than 95 per cent.

*****

An Iranian judge sentenced a Christian man to have his lips burnt with a cigarette for eating during the day in the Muslim holy month of Ramadan.

The barbaric punishment was carried out in public in a square in the city of Kermanshah. Five other Muslim men were also flogged in public with 70 lashes for not fasting during Ramadan, the city's deputy governor Ali Ashraf Karami reported.

A spokesperson from The National Council of Resistance of Iran, a political coalition which opposes the government, denounced the treatment as “savage” and called on western countries to take action.

*****

To Caliphate or not to Caliphate -- that is the question. Abu Bakr al Baghdadi's announcement of the creation of an Islamic Caliphate reveals a sense of hopelessness. His proclamation is strongly ideological, but to usher in this new era of a worldwide caliphate, he has to overturn an entire area: not in Syria, where ISIS will probably be wiped out by Bashar Assad's army, but in Iraq's weak underbelly, the Sunni area where the government does not have a strong army. There he drew a halt and issued this presumptuous statement.

The very fact they no longer refer to themselves as "ISIS" in which the words "Iraq and Syria" were present, but simply "Islamic State", as if it were a global entity, is ridiculous from the practical point of view. At the same time, it reveals the ideological dimension of the project to restore the caliphate of Baghdad, regarded as the most brilliant period of Islam.

But the majority of Muslims no longer dream of the caliphate, nor an empire without borders.

Most are simply attempting to live in a nation, so much so, that for years now, the Kurds have been attempting to give birth to their own independent nation.

- See more at: http://www.mercatornet.com/articles/view/the_desperate_dream_of_the_islamic_caliphate#sthash.RpeaTj0s.dpuf

*****

From the thousands that visit VOL’s website daily, we need to get a few of you converted to subscribers. We need a group of you who will regularly support VOL and its global ministry. It is time to do what needs to be done. Come on board as a Sustainer Subscriber - That's all it takes. Small and large donations are all accounted for and you will hear from us when you do send something to keep us going. We acknowledged all donations. We understand that not everyone can make a large donation, but thousands of you who do read VOL regularly can make a donation of some kind. Partnership is the key. So please take a few moments and drop us a check to keep VOL going. We are totally dependent on our readers.

You can send your tax deductible donation to:

VIRTUEONLINE
570 Twin Lakes Road
P.O. Box 111
Shohola, PA 18458

VOL's PAYPAL link here: http://www.virtueonline.org/support-vol/

You can follow VOL on Twitter: https://twitter.com/VirtueOnline

You can follow VOL on FACEBOOK: https://www.facebook.com/virtueonline/

THANK YOU FOR YOUR SUPPORT

David