The Waters of Confession Against the Tide of Idolatry

by David G. Duggan © 

Special to Virtueonline

www.virtueonline.org

July 7, 2025

Sadly, an Episcopal prelate wades again into waters he has no business testing. The Most Rev. Sean Rowe has used his shrinking platform and diminishing parishioner throw-weight to condemn the current administration’s policies, be they immigration enforcement, travel bans or refugee resettlement. Does he even know of this administration’s initiatives in Gaza, Ukraine and Central Africa, areas largely abandoned by its predecessor? Or does the Episcopal Church not care about peace. 

I won’t engage Mr. Rowe on his mea culpa about the Episcopal Church’s legacy of benign neglect toward slavery, indoctrinating schools for the indigenous, and (evidently) missionary activity masquerading as American foreign policy (what?). As Henry Ford said: “History is bunk,” and as William Faulkner (raised an Episcopalian) said: “The past is never dead; it is not even past.” No institution composed of mortals can claim moral superiority, so get over it. 

But where Mr. Rowe’s 4th of July message borders on idolatry, not to mention historical inaccuracy is when he extols the “Confessing Church” during the Nazi regime, as an example of religious opposition to the civil state. What Mr. Rowe does not explain is that for 200 years, German ministers–both Catholic and Protestant–have been civil servants, drawing their salaries from the government. Of course, the church is going to kowtow to the piper’s paymaster. But the Confessing Church did nothing to stop the mass deportations, the concentration camps, the gas chambers which that vile regime used to fuel its claim of Aryan superiority. And Dietrich Bonhoeffer, who became a member of Hitler’s military intelligence unit, was executed just days before his prison camp was liberated not because of his involvement in the Confessing Church. He was executed because he had been involved in–or at least had foreknowledge of–the von Stauffenberg plot to kill Hitler. 

I have been a lifelong Episcopalian, but I could care less whether a majority of the signers of the Declaration of Independence or 20% of our presidents have professed that faith. Nobody should choose his faith because George Washington, Franklin Roosevelt or George H.W. Bush worshiped at a particular church. Fortunately, those presidents knew that the civil state faces dangers which cannot be measured in plate collections or Sunday attendance. Significant, however, is that they didn’t let a cleric, who has never had to explain to a mother why her son or daughter died in a conflict under his authority, dictate foreign or domestic policy. 

Mr. Rowe may view the administration’s policies as reckless and he is entitled to his opinion. But to clothe that opinion in the wrap of First Amendment protection afforded all churches is to exalt one view of the Gospel over another. He doesn’t get that job. He is not the United States theologian-in-chief or its scolder-in-chief. Leave that to the misguided moralists who are trying to burn down government buildings, stop government processes, and impose their narrow vision of the public welfare on this great nation now in its 250th year of existence under the God who is Sovereign over all. 

David Duggan is a retired attorney living in Chicago. He is an occasional contributor to Virtueonline.