MISSOURI: A LAYMAN RESPONDS TO BISHOP'S LETTER TO GOOD SHEPHERD

AS EYE SEE IT: A Layman responds to Missouri Bishop's letter to Good Shepherd

28 February, 2004

The Rt. Rev. George Wayne Smith Bishop of Missouri 1210 Locust Street Saint Louis, Missouri 63103

Bishop Smith,

As with your letter of 26 February, I write to you with deep sadness in the aftermath of recent events. With the receipt of your letter, however, I feel that I must now make my voice heard and respond to the issues you have raised. As you have chosen to address only the symptoms of the sickness, which has invaded the Body of Christ, I must prayerfully remind you of their cause.

I would bring to your attention the words of the Apostle Paul to his son Titus:

"For a Bishop must be blameless, as the steward of God, just, holy, temperate; holding fast the faithful word he has been taught." (Titus 1:7-9).

When the House of Bishops, with your blessing, confirmed the election of Gene Robinson to be a Bishop of Christ's Church they did not merely express a loving acceptance of homosexuals, as Christ would have done. What they did was endorse homosexuality, adultery, and the violation of the sacred vows of marriage as exemplary expressions of faith in accordance with God's word. Yet God's word is abundantly and indisputably clear on this subject. Adultery and homosexuality are not blameless, just, holy, or temperate; they are sins.

These opposing views cannot be reconciled. To appoint as a steward of God a man who is openly and unrepentantly guilty of these sins is to deny and abandon the power and authority of God's word, as given to us in scripture. This, tragically, is just what the House of Bishops has done. And I would ask you, if the church is no longer firmly founded upon the rock of God's word, what is it founded upon? Where does it derive its authority? The answer appears to be that you, and many of your fellow bishops, have chosen to found it upon the ever-shifting sands of popular culture. But a church that does not abide by the word of God clearly cannot be God's church, so who's church has the Episcopal Church of the United States Become? I saw an interview with Gene Robinson in which he said that if people chose to leave his church because of his election, that was their problem. I think that statement, aside from revealing the actual depth of his spiritual commitment, encompasses the truth of the matter. The Episcopal Church has now become Gene Robinson's church, a church of man, not of God.

You say in your letter that the Episcopal Church is spacious enough to encompass vastly divergent opinions and that we need not assent to exactly the same theologies. Indeed, the Episcopal Church, in seeking to accommodate the fickle desires of men, has now become so spacious, and encompasses such vastly divergent opinions, that it is no longer possible to find within it the theology contained in the gospel of Christ. Again, I commend to your attention the words of the Apostle Paul, to the Churches of Galatia:

"As we said before so say I now again, if any man preach any other gospel than that you have received, let him be accursed. For do I now persuade men, or God? Or do I seek to please men? For if I yet pleased men, I should not be the servant of Christ" (Galatians 1:9-10).

Also consider Paul's admonition to the Colossians:

"As ye have therefore received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk ye in him: Rooted and built up in him, and stabilized in the faith, as ye have been taught, abounding therein with thanksgiving. Beware lest any man spoil you through philosophy and vain deceit, after the traditions of men, after the rudiments of the world, and not after Christ" (Colossians 2:6-8).

The breadth of theology that the Episcopal Church is now willing to embrace is precisely why it continues to diminish. Those who are in search of God seek a rock upon which to anchor their lives, not a weathervane to show them which way the wind blows. That rock is the unchanging word of God, as given to us in his scriptures. The Episcopal Church has become a weathervane.

Throughout your letter runs an undercurrent, the implication that we are being blindly and reluctantly herded down a path by a priest and wardens who are acting without our knowledge or consent. You say that the leaders of the Church of the Good Shepherd have taken us from the fold of the Episcopal Church. I tell you in all truth that they have not taken us anywhere.

We have remained steadfastly where we were, and they have remained with us. It is the small and ever-shrinking Episcopal Church that has left us. You have left the Church of the Good Shepherd, the much vaster fold of the vibrant and growing Anglican Communion, and the body of Christ's wider church on Earth.

Having denied the authority of scripture, having deviated from 2,000 years of Christian tradition, and having ignored the pleadings of Godly men from around the world, the Episcopal Church has been justly and widely rebuked and condemned for it's faithless actions by those who still remain true to the word and works of God. When the House of Bishops chose to abandon adherence to scripture, they also abandoned any pretense of godly authority.

Yet you would have it otherwise, you would admonish us not to break with an Episcopal Church that has been admonished for breaking with the teachings of God, and with the accepted doctrines of the Anglican Communion. Bishop Smith, unlike the Episcopal Church, we choose to remain faithful to those doctrines, and within that communion. You enjoin us from doing what you yourself have done. You urge us to acquiesce, to come along, and to join the Episcopal Church in its retreat from Gods teachings. But we have other guidance:

"Look to yourselves, that we lose not those things which we have wrought, but that we receive a full reward. Whosoever transgresseth, and abideth not in the doctrine of Christ, hath not God. He that abideth in the doctrine of Christ, he hath both Father and the Son. If there come any unto you, and bring not this doctrine, receive him not into your house, neither bid him God speed: For he that biddeth him God speed is partaker of his evil deeds" (2 John 1:8-11).

Goodbye, I say, but not God speed.

You tell us that you offered to allow us pastoral oversight by a bishop acceptable to both you and Father Paul. I tell you that Paul was right, and wise to reject this compromise, for it reduces the momentous issues with which we are wrestling to a personal dispute between you and our rector, a dispute which ends whenever either of you eventually retires from the stage. But this is not an issue of personalities; it is an issue of faith, an issue of doctrine. Paul may retire, you may retire, but the actions of the General Council, and the repudiation of the word of God by the Episcopal Church, will remain. A temporary accommodation does not alter this fact in any way, and it would be to our eternal disgrace if we allowed ourselves to be tempted from the difficult path of truth by such an empty solution. You warn us of anger, but we act not in anger, rather in steadfast faith, and though anger does not sustain (look to yourself as well, Bishop Smith), faith surely does, as it surely will.

You warn us of the consequences of severing our ties with the Episcopal Church, the ill that has befallen those who have gone before. You tempt us with the sweet prospect that we can avoid the dissent, the disunity, and the inevitable collapse which you predict, and which you do not wish to see befall us. That all will be forgiven if we, and Father Paul, simply recant. All we need do to avoid these evils is accept the actions of the House of Bishops, deny the authority of scripture, ignore the tenets of the Anglican Communion, and agree to remain within the grasp of a church that has abandoned God in favor of men. In short, we only need accept heresy as gospel. As Jesus said to Peter:" Get thee behind me, Satan: thou art an offense to me: for thou savorest not the things that be of God, but those that be of men" (Matthew 16:23).

Finally, I was so struck by something about your letter that I could not in good faith close without pointing it out to you. You refer to Constitutions, to charters, and to canons, but never once to Scripture. Indeed, your entire tone is more that of a corporate executive than of a Steward of God. I beg you to prayerfully reflect upon this, and consider God's will as I leave you with one final passage:

"And if it seem evil unto you to serve the Lord, choose you this day whom ye will serve; whether the gods which your fathers served that were on the other side of the flood, or the gods of the Amorites, in whose land ye dwell: but as for me and my house, we will serve the LORD.

And the people answered and said, God forbid that we should forsake the LORD, to serve other gods." (Joshua 24:15-16)

Yours in Christ

Erik H White Parishioner, Church of the Good Shepherd St. Louis, MO.