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By Stephen Bates, religious affairs correspondent The Guardian December 31, 2003     Evangelicals opposed to gay people within the Anglican communion presented an email petition yesterday to Rowan Williams, the Archbishop of Canterbury, calling on him to provide alternative oversight for those congregations which oppose bishops supporting Gene Robinson, the gay bishop of New Hampshire.   The petition’s organisers claimed it was backed by more than 13 million church-goersThe move was the latest flexing of muscles by traditionalists who have mobilised recently against any relaxation of the church’s opposition to homosexuals. It came against a backdrop of threats to split the worldwide communion which Dr Williams heads.   But there was some doubt about how many of those who had allegedly signed up either knew of the petition or supported it, since heads of families, clergy, bishops and archbishops were allowed to sign on behalf of all their family members, parishes, dioceses and provinces.   Support for the document rose from about 500,000 to 13 million in the last few days.   The organisers claimed the support of five primates, all from the developing world, eight bishops, though none from English dioceses, 4,013 individuals, 3,192 families, 249 parishes, eight of the communion’s 500 dioceses and everyone in the five provinces represented by the archbishop signatories. That included the entire church in Uganda, south-east Asia, the Congo, Central Africa, Kenya, the Indian ocean and the 22,000 Anglicans living in South America.     Described to those signing it as your Christmas gift to the Anglican communion, the petition was said to be your chance to make the Anglican communion as God intends it to be. The organisers claimed it showed a majority of  the church’s 70 million members across the world opposed the consecration o f Canon Robinson, whose election by the New England diocese was endorsed by US Episcopalians meeting at their annual convention in Minneapolis in August .   The petition dismissed the majority votes, including two-thirds of US bishops, as showing contempt by a minority group within the church.   Bishop Robinson was consecrated in New Hampshire by the head of the US church, Frank Griswold, in November and will succeed the current diocesan for the state in the spring.   The petition was organised by Anglican Mainstream, a group of conservative English evangelicals, which sprang up following the group’s successful mobilisation of opposition to the appointment of Jeffrey John, a gay priest, to the suffragan bishopric of Reading last summer.     Dr John was forced to stand down by Dr Williams, who had earlier endorsed his appointment.     The group is centred on the Oxford Centre for Mission Studies, which support s evangelical theological training for students from the developing world and has received funding from the Californian fundamentalist billionaire Howard F. Ahmanson.   The petition called on Archbishop Williams to no longer recognise the ministries of any bishop who attended Bishop Robinson’s consecration and to authorise traditionalist bishops to minister to congregations which can no longer20 support their bishops. The organisers also promised to pray for the archbishop and for all those who are confused or living in sin.     END

By MICHAEL MASSING The New York Times January 4, 2004     Throughout his nearly 19 years as the bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of Virginia, Peter James Lee has been an unwavering centrist and consensus builder. His diocese, the largest in the Episcopal Church, is diverse, with giant urban churches and tiny rural ones, liberal mainline congregations and conservative evangelical ones, and Lee has managed to hold them all together by astutely finding the midpoint on any controversial issue and luring both sides toward it. At the Episcopal Church’s general convention last summer in Minneapolis, Lee oversaw publication of a daily newsletter that offered a middle-of-the-road perspective on the many contentious issues facing the church. He called it Center Aisle the most contentious of the issues, of course, was the nomination of the Rev. V. Gene Robinson, an openly gay priest who had been living with another man for 14 years, to be the bishop of the Diocese of New Hampshire. For the 107 bishops in attendance, their vote on his confirmation would be the most scrutinized of their careers. And, based on Peter Lee’s record, there seemed little doubt about where he would come down. On matters of sexuality, his diocese was largely traditional, and Lee, throughout his reign, had resolutely refused to bless same-sex unions or to ordain noncelibate gay or lesbian priests. Under his leadership, in fact, the diocese has adopted an explicit statement that ‘‘the normative context for sexual intimacy is lifelong, heterosexual, monogamous marriage.’’     In the weeks leading up to the vote, though, Lee reflected back on the nearly 200 bishops whose candidacies he voted on over the years. Some were divorced and remarried. Others held theological views that were sharply at odds with his own. Some had refused to ordain women, a practice Lee endorsed. Yet he had voted for them all. Lee did not know Gene Robinson personally, but the Episcopalians of New Hampshire clearly felt he would make a good bishop. And so, on Aug. 3, the day before the vote, Lee sent a letter to his diocese indicating his intention to confirm. ‘‘I am convinced of the need to respect the Diocese of New Hampshire’s decision, in spite of my personal reservations and our current diocesan policy, which would not permit Canon Robinson to be ordained in Virginia,’’ he wrote. It was his prayer, he added, that the people of Virginia would ‘‘unite in the mission we share, even as we acknowledge respectfully differences among us.’’     The next day, Lee became one of 62 bishops to vote to confirm Robinson (with 45 against). However, his hope that the people of Virginia would unite behind him proved in vain. His vote set off a furor of an intensity and duration that stunned Lee. Since the end of the general convention in August, there have been forums and workshops on the issue of the gay bishop, and also protests. Rectors (as church heads are known) have been overwhelmed by phone calls from angry and confused parishioners. Hundreds have left their churches, and thousands more have insisted that none of their church contributions be passed on to the diocese. Already the diocese has lost more than $250,000 in anticipated revenues, forcing Bishop Lee to impose a hiring freeze.     Lee himself has received more than 1,000 letters and e-mail messages, and while some have been supportive, most have been critical and some downright abusive. ‘‘You have betrayed the calling of Christ to be faithful,’’ wrote a parishioner. ‘‘I have lost total respect for you and am ashamed to be a part of this denomination.’’     The uproar has been loudest at four giant churches located in the high-tech, sprawl-ridden, conservative suburbs southwest of Washington. These churches, with their combined 5,000 congregants, are evangelical in outlook -- they stress a personal relationship with Jesus and a literalist interpretation of the Bible. They also have strong ties to the American Anglican Council (A.A.C.), an orthodox organization within the Episcopal Church that is dedicated to fighting what it sees as the church’s theological flabbiness and capitulation to popular culture. Since the election of Gene Robinson, these churches have been a hotbed of resistance. All four parishes have made it clear to Peter Lee that they would not welcome his presence, and their rectors are exploring alternative forms of ecclesiastical oversight -- an arrangement some see as a step toward creating a new orthodox body that would be independent of Episcopal Church U.S.A., while remaining within the worldwide Anglican communion.     The Episcopal Church has been struggling with the issue of homosexuality since long before Gene Robinson was consecrated. In 1977 Bishop Paul Moore of New York ordained the first openly homosexual priest. In the 1990’s, Bishop John Spong of Newark moved even further, provocatively citing Scripture in support of embracing gays and others outside the traditional mainstream. The church, with just 2.3 million members, no longer has the exclusively Establishment character it once did; today it prides itself on its social activism and its ‘‘big tent’’ character. Louie Crew, the founder of Integrity, an Episcopal gay organization, estimates that as many as 20 percent of all Episcopal priests are gay or lesbian (though most are not open about it). Jo Belser, the lesbian daughter of a fundamentalist preacher who lives in Alexandria, Va., says that she joined the Episcopal Church because ‘‘it’s the only one that lets gay people grow spiritually without requiring that they stop being gay.’’     Even while mainline parishes in the Northeast and the West Coast were moving to the left, however, an opposing force was gaining momentum in more conservative regions of the country. Over the last 20 years, the evangelical fervor that has swept America has seeped into the Episcopal Church too. Evangelicals and other conservatives remain a minority -- of the 7,300 Episcopal parishes nationwide, about 260 are affiliated with the traditionalist A.A.C. -- but they have loudly proclaimed their view that the church is an elitist, liberal institution too ready to sacrifice biblical purity on the altar of secular culture.     After years of quiet organizing, some of the evangelicals are using the Robinson election to push for an autonomous body that will serve as the ‘‘true’’ voice of the church. If the dissidents -- led by such people as Bishop Robert Duncan of Pittsburgh and Bishop Jack Iker of Fort Worth -- are to realize their goal, they will have to win over the congregants and rectors in places like the Diocese of Virginia. Extending from the Potomac River in the north to the James River (which bisects Richmond) in the south, it is home to both red and blue America. In the diocese’s urbanized northern reaches, near Washington, parishioners work at policy centers and nonprofit agencies, lobbying and law firms, Congress and the State Department. The presence of the Pentagon, in Arlington, packs the pews with military officers, defense contractors and intelligence analysts. To the south, Richmond, a bastion of mainline Episcopalianism, has two dozen churches boasting members who trace their ancestry back to the Jamestown settlement.     Bishop Lee oversees the diocese’s 189 churches from a converted 19th-century mansion in downtown Richmond. The bishop’s office has soaring ceilings, parquet floors and, staring down from above the fireplace, a portrait of the Right Rev. James Madison, the state’s first bishop. With his ruddy complexion, silver hair, piercing blue eyes, purple bishop’s shirt, and sonorous, sermon-ready voice, Peter Lee projects an air of ecclesiastical authority. But his equanimity has been shaken by recent events. In the last few months he has faced what one conservative church activist calls a ‘‘theological lynch mob.’’ Parents have expressed concern about having him touch their children at confirmation ceremonies. He’s been told he would spend eternity in hell. ‘‘Psychological studies of clergy show that we are people who like to be liked,’’ says Lee, who is 65. ‘‘It’s painful that there are churches where I’m not welcome -- that there are people who feel I’ve betrayed them.’’     The sense of betrayal so many parishioners feel is, in a way, a measure of the moderate stance Lee so carefully cultivated. When he took over the diocese, in 1985, it was torn by regional rivalries and lingering disputes over the decision to revise the prayer book. A patient listener, Lee ‘‘picked up the pieces,’’ notes Russ Randle, a lawyer and active member of a church in Alexandria. ‘‘Like Cal Ripken, he kept showing up every day.’’ Faced with sensitive issues like homosexuality, Lee set up a group that periodically brought clergy and lay leaders together to air their views. The diocese thrived, with a new church opening in nearly every year of Lee’s tenure, and Lee’s strengths as a moderator -- or a fence sitter, depending on your sympathies -- were at least partly responsible for its stability.     Viewed against this backdrop, Lee’s decision to support Gene Robinson seemed uncharacteristically bold. How, I asked, had he arrived at it? He began his answer by describing his gradual evolution on matters of social equality. ‘‘I was born in Mississippi and raised in Pensacola, Fla.,’’ along a stretch of the Gulf Coast ‘‘known as the redneck Riviera,’’ Lee said. His father, the manager of a manufacturing plant, was a lay officer of a local Episcopal church. It, like the schools Lee attended, was segregated.     In the spring of 1963, while he was working as a copy editor for a newspaper in Richmond and pondering the ministry, Lee followed with interest the nonviolent demonstrations being organized by the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. to protest segregation in Birmingham. Several local clergymen criticized King for moving too quickly, but Lee was moved by King’s argument that injustices would never vanish by waiting until everyone was ready. Clerical leaders, the young Lee concluded, should use their authority to fight discrimination.     But Lee was not a natural activist. In 1965, when he was attending the Virginia Theological Seminary, several of his fellow students went to Selma to march with King. Lee did not join them. ‘‘Emotionally, I wasn’t there -- I wasn’t ready to demonstrate,’’ Lee recalls. Soon after, on a visit to his parents in Pensacola, he gave a ride to their housekeeper, a black woman who worked for the family for many years. ‘‘She said, ‘Mr. Peter, I saw all these young preachers walking with Dr. King, but I didn’t see you,’’’ Lee said. ‘‘That was a sore that went deep into my soul.’’     In Lee’s telling, his opposition to racial discrimination began to extend to sexual orientation in the 70’s. At that time, he was the rector of a church in Chapel Hill, N.C., a liberal university town. The local chapter of Integrity invited Lee to perform the Eucharist. ‘‘I’m pretty conservative on these things,’’ he said. ‘‘But my experience showed that the chapel was a refuge for gays and lesbians from all across North Carolina.’’     As the bishop of Virginia, Lee met many gay and lesbian couples, and they seemed to be faithful churchgoers. In 1997, he began consulting with a prominent Roman Catholic psychiatrist on sensitive pastoral matters. He convinced Lee that ‘‘you do real damage to gay and lesbian people by telling them that the way they are made is somehow defective,’’ Lee told me.     This past summer, in the weeks before the general convention, Lee tried to sort through his many conflicting impulses on the role of gays in the church. He still didn’t feel comfortable with the idea of blessing same-sex unions. And he wasn’t ready to personally ordain a noncelibate gay priest. But his growing awareness of gays as flesh-and-blood members of the church was tugging him in the other direction. He immersed himself in Scripture. As he well knew, the handful of Biblical passages that deal explicitly with homosexuality are almost uniformly negative. Yet he also knew that on many moral issues -- divorce, slavery, stoning adulterers to death -- the interpretation of Scripture had changed along with shifting cultural norms. Rereading the 15th chapter of the Acts of the Apostles, Lee was struck by how the early leaders of the church adapted the requirements of Jewish law to the realities of the gentile world. This seemed to him a clear call for an inclusive church.     Finally, Lee spoke with his wife of 38 years, Kristina. ‘‘She’s been very forceful on this,’’ Lee said. ‘‘She said, ‘Peter, do you want to be on the side of the future or of the past?’ That was a significant question for me.’’     Lee decided to embrace the future. Yet, still very much the young man who couldn’t bring himself to march with Martin Luther King Jr., he decided to keep his real reasons to himself. And so, in the letter he sent from Minneapolis, he stressed what he felt was the innocuous principle of local autonomy, hoping to avoid controversy.     Instead, he provoked a storm. The emotions unleashed by his vote proved so explosive that he decided to hold a series of forums at which parishioners could vent their views. Waking up in the middle of the night, he fitfully went over in his mind all that critics had said about him. He then set to work on a new statement explaining his vote, deciding to go public with the intellectual journey he’d made.     The first of the meetings took place in a diocesan boarding school in Middlesex County, east of Richmond, on Sept. 15. Lee, armed with his middle-of-the-night musings and a new determination, described the long hours he’d spent in prayer, the many bishops he’d consulted. Studying Scripture anew, he said, he had come away convinced ‘‘that the Gospel is ever-increasing its power to erase the barriers that we human beings erect among ourselves.’’ And, rereading Martin Luther King’s ‘‘Letter From a Birmingham Jail,’’ he was reminded ‘‘that significant change, especially change that involves new understanding of justice, often comes in a disruptive and disturbing manner.’’ In the end, Lee told the audience, the vote on Gene Robinson’s consecration presented ‘‘a conflict between hope and fear. Hope for God’s grace versus fear of change. I chose hope.’’     It was a remarkable moment for Lee, a coming out of sorts for a man who had spent his whole career keeping his views to himself. The audience, however, sat silent. Shortly after, the Rev. Jeffrey Cerar, who had opposed Gene Robinson in Minneapolis, got up. ‘‘Our general convention has abandoned the teaching of the universal church,’’ he proclaimed. ‘‘This is not just a difference of opinion. It is a departure from the very purpose and identity of the church.’’ When he was done, much of the audience rose to its feet and cheered.     ‘‘I became aware at that first meeting that my statement was not going to change anybody’s mind, and that my task was to receive the hostility of the people with as much grace as I could muster and not become hostile in return,’’ Lee says.     His effort at stoicism would receive its greatest test at a forum held at the Virginia Theological Seminary. One after another, parishioners rose to accuse him of being an apostate and of turning his back on the Bible. And then, in front of the crowd of some 500 people, a woman from All Saints’, one of the big four evangelical churches, read from a letter to Lee from the church’s lay leadership regarding his scheduled visit to preside over a confirmation class. ‘‘We would respectfully ask that, instead of you visiting All Saints’ on Nov. 9, 2003, you send Bishop Gray for confirmation,’’ the parishioner read. ‘‘Our people are so distressed by your views that contradict the very clear teaching of Scripture that your visit this fall would be painful and divisive.’’ Gasps arose from the crowd.     ‘‘It was very painful to be uninvited from All Saints’, and in so public a way,’’ Lee later told me. The insult was compounded by the fact that the letter had been sent to him weeks earlier, and that he had already told the church that he would agree to send another bishop in his place.     I asked John Guernsey, the rector of All Saints’, why the church had insisted on reading the letter at the gathering. ‘‘With all the turmoil in the Episcopal Church,’’ Guernsey told me, ‘‘we’ve been reassured by the fact that our bishop has held to the orthodox faith of the church and upheld the historic Christian teaching about sexuality and marriage. Then we found the rug pulled out from under us.’’ Lee’s subsequent efforts to explain his vote only made things worse, Guernsey went on: ‘‘Initially, he said it was a matter of autonomy. Since then, he has been defending the rightness of his vote. He’s been quoting Martin Luther King, saying that it is not simply regrettable what the church has done but that it is the right thing, that this is a justice issue. If anything, he has exacerbated the pain, the sense of betrayal.’’ In light of this, he said, the church vestry ‘‘felt it was appropriate to make a public witness of our position.’’     All saints’, together with the Falls Church, Church of the Apostles and Truro Church, constitute a bloc of evangelical churches that have led the charge against Peter Lee. For months their rectors have been talking with the bishop, trying to hammer out a deal that would allow for alternative oversight while leaving broad authority in the hands of the diocese. Leading these discussions has been Martyn Minns, the rector of Truro. To see how the resistance looked from the inside, I arranged to visit him. I was surprised at what I found.     Located in the city of Fairfax, about 15 miles southwest of Washington, Truro attracts 1,400 people on a typical Sunday, making it one of the 10 largest Episcopal congregations in the country. On matters of morality, it is among the staunchest. Its congregation includes many Republican activists -- people like Diane Knippers, the president of the Institute on Religion and Democracy, which works to expose what it considers the liberal excesses of mainline Protestantism. Some top figures in the American Anglican Council also worship here. Minns himself has worked closely with the council, and Truro has been host of a number of A.A.C. events.     A sturdy 6-foot-2, Minns is an imposing figure in his clerical black. With his angular face, dark complexion, neat beard and thinning dark hair, Minns, who is 60, seems to have stepped out of the eastern Mediterranean world in which Paul evangelized. Lining the walls of his office are handsomely built shelves filled with books. A modernist print of a crucified Jesus hangs on one wall. African crafts are scattered about.     ‘‘This is a very painful time for us,’’ Minns says, his voice carrying traces of his native Nottingham, England. ‘‘I’ve gotten about 40 letters from people saying they are leaving. I’ve been involved in this parish for 12 years, and to watch it fall apart is very painful.’’ He speaks quickly and to the point -- a man in a hurry.     ‘‘Every society draws lines about what is behaviorally accepted,’’ he says. ‘‘The line I’m drawing is the one that Judaism and Christianity have been teaching for 2,000 years. To move away from that to basically a free-for-all -- where do you draw the line? . . . I draw the line on the basis of Biblical revelation.’’     Couldn’t people have different ways of interpreting the Bible and learn to live with those differences? I asked. ‘‘That’s a postmodern idea,’’ Minns said dismissively. ‘‘I’m trained as a mathematician. Either something is true or it isn’t. When Gene Robinson says his sexual activity is sacramental and I consider it to be sinful, in my mind it has to be one or the other.’’     Minns’s training in mathematics came at the University of Birmingham. After graduating, he was hired by Mobil to work in New York. Feeling a call to the ministry, he entered Virginia Theological Seminary in 1975. After being ordained, he served in several parishes, including one in Manhattan. Minns arrived at Truro in 1991 and slowly built it into a powerhouse. He created and expanded ministries to work with inner-city kids, battered spouses and pregnant women. In 1998 he founded Five Talents, which extends small loans to budding entrepreneurs in the developing world. Minns has used the good will generated by the program to strengthen his ties with like-minded bishops in Africa, Asia and Latin America. ‘‘I spend more time with bishops in the global south than with the bishop of Virginia,’’ he observed with glee. In July, for instance, Truro was host of a visit by five Anglican archbishops from Africa, Asia and Australia, including Peter Akinola of Nigeria. Akinola joined Minns and 50 other conservative Episcopalians in a warning that confirming Gene Robinson could ‘‘precipitate a dramatic realignment of the church.’’     Given his conservative moral views, I wondered how Minns fared during his three years in Manhattan -- America’s own Sodom. He brightened. ‘‘I love New York -- the energy, the craziness,’’ he said. ‘‘I still miss the Upper West Side’’ -- his church, All Angels’, is on West 80th Street. ‘‘You open the door and you never know what will hit you.’’ Minns’s church was next to Zabar’s, the iconic food emporium, and whenever he returns to the city, he goes there. ‘‘It’s my idea of living,’’ he said.     In a corner of his office, I noticed a shofar. It reminded me of a conversation I had the day before with Jo Belser, a leader in Virginia’s Integrity organization. Integrity, she told me, had invited Minns to speak, and he had accepted. While his talk left little doubt about where he stood on homosexuality, the fact that Minns addressed the group at all distinguished him from many of his conservative brethren, she said. Noting his love of books, modern art and New York, she added, ‘‘I think he has a Jewish soul.’’     When I mentioned this to him, Minns told me how, when his mother was dying several years ago, she revealed that his great-grandfather was Jewish. ‘‘I was delighted,’’ he recalled. ‘‘I felt very proud. One of my missions in life has been to get Christians to focus on their Jewish roots. Without that, we lose a lot.’’ I was having a hard time fitting Minns’s various parts together, and I told him so. ‘‘I’m very hard to typecast,’’ he said with relish. He recalled how in New York, ‘‘we had everyone you could imagine coming into my church -- crack addicts, a transvestite in full regalia. I loved them. They became a part of the congregation. I’d say: ‘God put us here to work. Are you willing to do that?’ And I saw some profound changes.’’ God, he added, ‘‘can change lives’’ -- even those of homosexuals. Minns says he believes that gays can be converted to heterosexuality through Christ-centered counseling -- an idea that almost all gays vehemently reject.     So, I wondered, what did this one-eighth-Jewish evangelical who regarded gays and lesbians as grievous sinners think Truro should do? Should it leave the Episcopal Church? It was hard getting him to say. At times during our talk, Minns sounded like a loyal foot soldier of the American Anglican Council; at others, he oozed conciliation and accommodation. For a man with such strong opinions, he seemed maddeningly hard to pin down.     I started to see why when I sat down with five of his parishioners, whom Minns had arranged for me to see. We met in his office while he was off tending to pastoral matters. Clean-cut and articulate, the group was unanimous in expressing outrage over the idea of a homosexual bishop, even while insisting that homosexuality was not the issue. ‘‘The core issue is not homosexuality but biblical authority,’’ said Jeff Fedorchak, a 42-year-old consultant. ‘‘It’s not open to interpretation. It’s homosexuality this time -- what will it be the next?’’ In our conversation, the word ‘‘clear’’ as applied to Scripture and its meaning kept coming up. On all sides these devout Christians felt assaulted by the lurid offerings of consumerist America -- half-dressed teen idols, gore-filled video games, Internet porn a click away -- and, seeking a lifeline, they had grasped hold of the Bible. Gay rights seemed especially threatening, for they saw it as challenging the sacrament of marriage, the foundation of their moral universe. At the same time, the intensity of their feelings about Gene Robinson indicated that something more profound was at work, that the issue of homosexuality touched them in a very visceral and vulnerable spot.     In the end, there was only one point on which the group disagreed, and that was how Truro should respond. ‘‘I think we should stand up for the truth,’’ said Bill Mullins, a lawyer, expressing a desire to leave. ‘‘We should declare ourselves not in communion with this and suffer the consequences.’’ Jamie Brown, a college student, was less certain. ‘‘I’m torn on what to do,’’ he said.     To judge from their comments, Truro seemed far more divided than its public face would suggest. And Minns’s own statements reflected this. Dropping in at the tail end of our discussion, he began talking expansively about Truro’s relations with the Anglican Communion. He urged everyone to read ‘‘The Next Christendom,’’ by Philip Jenkins, a professor at Pennsylvania State University. The book describes the rapid growth of Christianity in the developing world and argues that, given the thoroughly evangelical nature of the faith there, Christianity in the West will inevitably follow. ‘‘Jenkins thinks the U.S. church has a big dilemma,’’ Minns said. ‘‘Is it going to go where world Christianity is going, or will it be left to an elite group of Unitarians?’’ Such remarks would seem to support a militant stance. Yet, in his very next breath, Minns counseled caution: ‘‘Our hope is not to jump into a separate province. I believe we can find a way not to have to do that.’’ He added, ‘‘I’m concerned about practical stuff -- about people being fired and churches closed.’’     He was referring to Episcopal canon law, which holds that if a parish leaves the church, its diocese retains possession of its buildings and other assets. If Truro were suddenly to pack up and leave, the Diocese of Virginia would lay claim to its property -- a church complex, an office building, three large houses and eight acres of land. Lawsuits would inevitably follow. The Truro congregants might be forced to start anew. ‘‘I have lots of wonderful lawyers who keep me from breaking the law until I’m sure I want to,’’ he went on. ‘‘I don’t want to give $10 million ‘‘ -- the value of Truro’s assets -- ‘‘to an institution I don’t agree with.’’ What’s more, Minns is mindful of his many parishioners who love Truro, are raising their children there and would hate to have to leave.     I was beginning to detect in Minns a pattern: tough rhetoric combined with pragmatic action. It would be on full display that evening, when some 400 people attended a church meeting to discuss Truro’s future. Standing under a giant gold cross suspended above the altar, Minns described the new network of dissenting dioceses that he and other conservatives were hoping to form -- a structure that could become an independent province ‘‘if that time came.’’ Then, with barely a pause, he turned to the proposal for ‘‘flying bishops,’’ sympathetic prelates who would minister to Truro and the other conservative churches, thus allowing them to stay in the Episcopal Church.     It was only toward the end of the meeting, after nearly a dozen parishioners had expressed their outrage at Bishop Robinson’s confirmation, that Minns was pressed to clarify his position on secession. ‘‘I’m really maddened by this process,’’ declared a young woman with smartly cut short hair. She and her husband, she said, had decided to leave the Episcopal Church. They would, however, consider returning if conservative Anglicans got their own, independent province. Was the new network Minns had discussed likely to lead to such an outcome?     ‘‘This network could become such a province,’’ Minns responded. ‘‘Peter Akinola has said he cannot be at the same table as Frank Griswold,’’ the presiding bishop of the Episcopal Church and a supporter of Robinson. ‘‘So quite possibly this will split the entire Anglican Communion.’’ But he sidestepped the issue of whether this would necessitate Truro’s leaving the Episcopal Church.     Later I observed to Minns that he seemed to be trying to channel the congregation’s anger, and, ultimately, contain it. He agreed. ‘‘This crowd is self-selecting,’’ he said. Those who feel the most aggrieved about these matters are the ones who show up at such events. He had heard from many other congregants who either disagreed with his stand on Gene Robinson or who didn’t know what to think. He said he felt dutybound to represent their views as well.     In many ways, then, the ambiguity I had sensed in Minns was intentional, a reflection of his dual constituencies. One is the militants, the people who share the goals of groups like the A.A.C. and the Institute on Religion and Democracy. These outfits have a sharp-edged political agenda that can be satisfied only by a full break with the church. At the same time, he has a flock to minister to, and many of its members fear the consequences of a break -- fears that Minns himself fully appreciates. So he has two hats, the one political and the other pastoral, and he is trying to wear them both.     It’s a strange paradox: Martyn Minns, the insistent evangelist, is seeking compromise, while Peter Lee, the pragmatic fence sitter, is standing on principle. Together, the two are lurching toward a middle ground that would satisfy the conservatives’ desire for autonomy while respecting the bishop’s ultimate authority over such matters as choosing rectors, deciding whom to ordain and enforcing church laws.     This lurching seems emblematic of the church as a whole. In mid-December, the network Minns referred to at the Truro meeting came into being -- sort of. Robert Duncan, the outspoken bishop of the Diocese of Pittsburgh, announced the formation of a new Network of Anglican Communion Dioceses and Parishes, under his supervision. Thirteen of the church’s 100 dioceses in the United States were said to be joining the new network. While not seceding from the Episcopal Church, Duncan said, the group would try to win recognition from Anglican bishops overseas as the authentic Episcopal Church. Yet, within days, several bishops from those 13 dioceses disavowed their connection to the network, saying that the announcement had been premature. The affair had a Keystone Kops air about it, and it pointed to the hurdles the conservatives are facing as they push for an alternative to the Episcopal Church.     According to James Solheim, the director of the Episcopal News Service, the conservatives not only constitute a small minority within the church, but many of them ‘‘are saying schism is not the answer.’’ The idea of being bound up for years in costly and distracting litigation weighs heavily on them. Truro typifies that. That a rector as conservative as Martyn Minns is so intent on remaining within the Episcopal fold bodes ill for the advocates of a rupture.   None of the current bureaucratic machinations over ‘‘extra-provincial structures’’ address the fundamental divide over sexual orientation in the church, or the hurt it has caused people like Jo Belser. Frank Griswold says that most Episcopalians are neither outraged nor exultant at the election of Gene Robinson; rather, they are confused. That certainly seems true in Virginia. Most of its 189 parishes are fitfully trying to come to terms with the seismic events of the past few months. In sermons, forums and Bible-study groups, parishioners have been discussing, arguing and educating themselves about the rightful place of gays and lesbians in a church that for two millennia has shunned them. However great their differences, most seem to feel that the Episcopal tent is large enough to accommodate them all.     In my conversation with Bishop Lee, I asked when he thought Virginia might ordain a gay or lesbian priest. ‘‘We already have,’’ he said, noting that a half-dozen or so clergy members -- some of whom he had ordained -- had already come out to him privately. The bishop remains opposed to ordaining noncelibate gays, because of both his own personal resistance and that of his diocese. He’s only willing to go so far. But, he says, ‘‘I cannot imagine that in 30 years people are going to have difficulty with pastors in any mainstream denomination ordaining gays who are in committed relations.’’     Reflecting on the events of the past few months, Lee said that, for all the pain they’ve caused, they’ve ‘‘deepened my prayer life. And I like to think that down the road I’ll be remembered as a bishop who did the right thing, who brought the diocese through a difficult time and who helped find a way to let people live together with their differences.’’     Michael Massing is writing a book about the rivalry between Erasmus and Martin Luther and how it shaped European history.

By David W. Virtue   Tensions heightened in the Diocese of New Westminster when the bishop, Michael Ingham delivered his final ultimatum to the Vancouver 11 and their eight parishes - reject Yukon Bishop Terence Buckle’s offer of spiritual sanctuary and accept my authority, or I will throw the lot of you out of your parishes and out of the Anglican Church of Canada. Declare your obedience or face discipline, he told the faithful The Anglican Church in New Westminster (ACiNW) - that core of faithful parishes responded telling Ingham, in so many words, NUTS. We will not surrender to accommodate your miserable sexual morality.     The CANADIAN ESSENTIALS GROUP asked the House of Bishops to accept Bishop Buckle’s offer of alternative episcopal oversight saying it would make it possible for them to remain within the Anglican Church of Canada.     But Vancouver-based Bishop Michael Ingham appointed Bishop William Hockin, 64, the soon to be retired diocesan Bishop of Fredericton, New Brunswick as an episcopal visitor to parishes that oppose the Diocese of New Westminster’s decision to bless same-sex unions and feel themselves adversely affected. The Episcopal Visitor measure was offered as a part of the blessing motion at the Synod 2002 in New Westminster. The eight parishes rejected it then, and have continued rejecting it ever since.     But Hockin, along with several traditional Bishops from Canada and the United States did urge the Diocese of New Westminster not to proceed with a rite of blessing for same sex unions. But the central core of the problem was that Bishop Terry Buckle (Yukon) offered Ingham oversight WITH JURISDICTION for the beleaguered eight. That was not what Ingham was offering Hockin. The truth we all learned was that Ingham would not yield an inch on jurisdiction to Buckle or anyone.     Archbishop David Crawley, British Columbia’s metropolitan started disciplinary action against Bishop Buckle even though Bishop Buckle had done nothing except make an offer.   Canadian Primate Michael Peers perhaps feeling the pressure announced he would resign.     Canon Bill Atwood, EKKLESIA, an international organization linking Western orthodox and Global South bishops said what was needed now was not parallel jurisdiction, but replacement jurisdiction. Certainly the church was heading in that direction.     The CHURCH OF ENGLAND was told to rethink its bar on sex before marriage. The C of E was told it should consider changing its teaching on sex before marriage and preach that cohabitation should be viewed as a new path from the single state to the married one.     And ANGLICANS ONLINE offered an unqualified apology to the Jensens of Sydney, for its editorial blast at the two men. The Rev. David C. James came out with an unqualified apology saying, We were out of place to express an opinion of that nature. Our motives were pure, as we expect that the Jensens’ were, too, and any differences that we might or might not have with the way a diocese is operating, we should keep to ourselves or communicate in private.     The Bishop of Jos, NIGERIA, Benjamin Kwashi weighed in on Bishop Bennison’s outrageous remark that Jesus was a sinner and wrote VIRTUOSITY saying, This only goes to show that the Rt. Rev. Robert Duncan (Bishop of Pittsburgh) was right! It also further proves Fr. David Moyer (Church of the Good Shepherd, Rosemont) was right. The [Episcopal] Church is definitely in trouble and Bennison is only a symptom. His statement will be unacceptable to Islam and one wonders who he wants to please. This is shocking and a pity, mene, mene, tekel, peres.     The House of Bishop’s Theology Report, which nixed same-sex rites for homosexuals truly gored the ox of the Rev. Michael Hopkins, president of Integrity. He like Louie Crew was outraged at the report and said he and the Claiming the Blessing crowd, were struck by the scant amount of theology contained in a report which defines itself as   theological. Hopkins said the terms gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people were accepted by the world-wide LGBT community to describe the rich diversity of our own reality.     THE ARCHBISHOP OF CANTERBURY convened a three-day meeting of Christian and Muslim scholars in Doha, in the Gulf state of Qatar. Dr Williams said the seminar, Building Bridges, was a clear demonstration that we do not have to be imprisoned in mutual hostility and misunderstanding. About 30 scholars attended the meeting, which was a follow-up to one held in Lambeth Palace in January 2002 by Lord Carey, when he was still Archbishop.     Then came shattering news revealed by Dr. Kirk Hadaway, Director of Research at the Episcopal Church Center, that the typical Episcopal congregation had average Sunday attendance of 80 persons.  It is the typical Episcopal Church that has been our primary source of growth during the last decade. Not very heartening news, but then if you don’t have a discernible gospel to declare why should bishops and priests believe that people are going to knock down the doors looking for New Life when none is to be found?     The Episcopal Church left blind-sided by the U.S. victory in Iraq took a body blow in the person of its arch-defender Frank Griswold when the television image of the caste iron figure of Saddam Hussein fell to the ground. The elitist left in the ECUSA establishment got mud all over their collective faces when it was finally apparent to the world that the US forces of liberation had won a war with unbelievably light American casualties.   CATHOLIC AND EPISCOPALIANS proposed joint-bishop meetings to foster Christian unity. The idea was part of the Americans’ response to a 1999 report on church authority produced in international talks between the Vatican and the Anglican Communion (in which the Episcopal Church is the U.S. branch). The American paper said Episcopal and Anglican bishops should accompany Roman Catholic colleagues when they make their periodic reports to the pope and attend Vatican synods, and participate in meetings of the U.S. bishops’ conference with a voice but no vote. Similarly, Catholic bishops would join regular meetings of Episcopal and Anglican bishops. On the authority issue, the paper says a reformed understanding and practice of the papacy is needed for reunion, and that Anglicans have problems with Catholic views of infallible teaching and lay participation     This all later collapsed when the openly homosexual V. Gene Robinson was consecrated Bishop of New Hampshire.     The DIOCESE OF MICHIGAN voted at their diocesan convention for same-sex unions in disobedience to world Anglican opinion.     In a message to the 8th Anglican Indigenous Network (AIN) Meeting in New Zealand, Frank Griswold said, A gift of our Anglican Communion is that we are able to come together to share in one another’s realities and contacts, and therefore have a better understanding of how Christ moved throughout the world.     The search for a new Bishop of NEW HAMPSHIRE heated up with some interesting candidates. The most interesting was of course, V. Gene Robinson the current Canon to the Ordinary, an openly homosexual man who announced his divorce to his wife at a Eucharist, and later moved in with his new male lover, became Dean and now wanted to be a bishop.     THE AMERICAN ANGLICAN COUNCIL the conservative wing of the ECUSA, and the Claiming the Blessing/Integrity leaders met in Maryland with the leaders agreeing to be nice to one another when they met at GC2003 in Minneapolis. Both sides would present their respective points of view at GC’03, but they acknowledged that the struggle was going to be difficult for everyone.     Movements and rumblings in the ANGLICAN CONTINUUM continued with Archbishop Louis Falk resigning as head of the Traditional Anglican Communion, the largest of the international Continuing Church groups. The TAC has 80,000 followers in India and another 80,000 in South Africa and about 3,000 in the U.S. Other TAC members can be found in Australia, Torres Strait, England, Canada with missions in the US and Puerto Rico, Central America, Mexico and Columbia. The new Primate John Hepworth of Australia was named to replace him.     Inter communion relations progressed with closer ties between two longtime--and long- divided--Continuing Church bodies - the Anglican Catholic Church (ACC) Metropolitan, Archbishop-Brother John- Charles FODC, recently called on his entire flock to pray for the leaders of both the ACC and the Anglican Province of Christ the King (APCK), whose leader Archbishop Robert Morse also sought to heal damaged relations between the two bodies and pave the way for mutual work...in fulfilling our joint mission.     But a split occurred in the APCK with members, forming the Diocese of the Holy Cross moving for the establishment of a free or third province for English traditionalists with Forward in Faith, UK (FIF-UK).     In RIDGECREST, North Carolina 1,000 Episcopalians and Anglicans from a dozen Anglican provinces, 30 Episcopal dioceses, two seminaries, over a dozen Episcopal bishops and another dozen bishops from overseas, 200 clergy and hundreds of laity came together to explore ways to be obedient to the Great Commission, proclaim the gospel of Jesus Christ, make disciples, build the kingdom and plant churches. New Wineskins for Global Mission 2003, sponsored by the Episcopal Church Missionary Community, Ambridge, PA has become the most ambitious and successful Episcopal Mission outreach in the ECUSA today.   Lady Caroline Cox a feisty British Baroness and a world authority on Christian persecution gave a moving presentation on the persecution of Christians in the Sudan.   She blasted President George W. Bush for reneging on the US’s hard line policy against the Government of the Sudan opposing the slaughter of Christians in the southern part of that country. She said the Bush administration had gone back on its policy of no compromise with the government while it continues to slaughter Christians in the south over oil and religion and a petition was drawn which was forwarded to the White House.     The CANADIAN HOUSE OF BISHOPS thumbed their collective noses at the wider Anglican Communion by repudiating their own guidelines and Lambeth, which forbade the blessing of same-sex unions. Some revisionist like BC Archbishop David Crawley (a 100 percent Ingham supporter) said he was not worried at all about the views of Primates from around the world and how upset they were. Many orthodox bishops in the Canadian House were sickened, appalled and infuriated by the decision.     The Bishop of Pennsylvania, Charles Bennison tasted more of his own shoe leather by  comparing God to Saddam Hussein’ saying God uses Weapons of Mass Destruction. The flood was the first weapons of mass destruction. His mouth became a WID - Weapon of Individual Destruction. Bennison then proceeded to moderate a meeting at the Prince Music Theatre in Philadelphia, which included a gay rabbi, the first openly gay ordained Episcopal priest and a Muslim homosexual. It was part of what used to be called PrideFest. His actions only alienated him further from the orthodox in his diocese.     DEPOSED MEXICAN BISHOP said he was innocent of stealing more than $1 million dollars. The Bishop of Northern Mexico, the Rt. Rev. German Martinez Marquez wrote a letter to the US Episcopal Church saying that he was innocent of the charges of grand larceny leveled at him by a fellow bishop, and urged the Episcopal Church to send funds to support he and his family. Both he and the Archbishop and Primate of Mexico Samuel Espinoza were found guilty of the theft of millions of dollars over a period of years; money given by the ECUSA and were deposed.     BY MID YEAR it was apparent The Episcopal Church was caught in three great crises. The first was a crisis of false teaching, the second was a crisis of catholic order, and thirdly a crisis of courage. Nothing was solved, the crisis got worse as the year progressed.     The Archbishop of Canterbury, perhaps seeing the writing on the wall dropped a bombshell while in New York City talking up Benedictine spirituality. In a private conversation with ECUSA’s Presiding Bishop Frank Griswold, he asked him, are we a federation of churches or a communion? He raised the question just prior to the meeting of the Primates in Brazil.     The Anglican Church of Canada acknowledged that it had closed 954 churches of which 526 were closed between 1992 -1994 (almost 5 a week and very close to one every day). And while this was going on in Canada, the Church of the Province of Nigeria was adding literally millions of new Anglican believers with whole new dioceses, bishops and archbishops. This prompted Fr. Charles Nalls, a priest and head of the Canon Law Institute, in Washington, D.C. to say that real communion means real relationship; real relationship means workable discipline. None was forthcoming.     ST. JAMES THE LESS in Philadelphia closed its school doors because of the litigation by Bishop Bennison. Fr. David Ousley, parish priest and headmaster of the school still faces being tossed out of his parish and rectory. His case is on appeal.     The British queen’s representative in AUSTRALIA. Peter Hollingworth stepped down over rape claims. Hollingworth, 68, denied the rape, which allegedly happened in the 1960s but only surfaced this year. His accuser, Rosemarie Anne Jarmyn, 57, committed suicide. Integrity Uganda, a knock-off of ECUSA’s sodomite organization and a plant on African soil, fabricated a false Griswold invitation and put out a press release saying that they had been asked by the Archbishop of Uganda to be part of the welcoming committee for ECUSA Presiding Bishop Frank Griswold when he came in June. Virtuosity smelt a rat and got the truth. The Anglican Archbishop totally repudiated any such offer and Canon Stanley Ntagali wrote and told Virtuosity that it was all a fabrication.     THE ANGLICAN COMMUNION’S 38 Primates representing some 70 million Anglicans globally gathered in Gramado, Brazil to contemplate their future together as an undivided communion.     Prior to the Gramado meeting a group of African archbishops, known as CAPA - the Council of Anglican Provinces of Africa - met behind closed doors in Sao Paulo, with only a handful of the archbishops aware that such a meeting was taking place. CAPA is comprised of all the provinces of Africa, though only seven Primates were present at this meeting. CAPA was formed to provide links for common concerns for the Anglican provinces in Africa. They met very discretely in San Paulo a day before the Primates gathered in Gramado to weigh the implications of the book True Union in the Body and the possibility of broken communion if Western provinces continue to perform same-sex marriages. There was clear agreement that the same-sex agenda had the capacity to split the communion.     THE 36 ARCHBISHOPS met in the Serrano hotel in their first closed-door meeting where Archbishop Drexel Gomez (West Indies) made a brilliant presentation speaking for 30 minutes on the book True Union in the Body which came down hard and fast against same-sex marriages and the blessing of same.     After considerable discussion the PRIMATES declared rites for same-sex unions unacceptable. The Primates said in a Pastoral Letter that rites for same-sex unions have no theological consensus, and therefore, we as a body cannot support the authorization of such rites. The question of public rites for the blessing of same sex unions was still a cause of potentially divisive controversy, they declared. The Archbishop of Canterbury confirmed that there was no theological consensus about same sex unions.     An Integrity response to the Pastoral Letter from the Primates of the Anglican Communion condemned the report arguing that their stories were not heard. They were even mad at Griswold for not taking the opportunity to share with his brother Primates the theology statement offered by Claiming the Blessing, and for presenting only the Report from the Bishops’ Committee on Theology which the House of Bishops declined to receive as a Mind of the House when it met in Kanuga.     But in the midst of the Gramado meeting came explosive news out of England that the Church of England had elevated to the bishopric, England’s foremost gay apologist Canon Jeffrey John, Canon theologian of Southwark Cathedral as the new Suffragan Bishop of Reading. Rowan Williams hurried back to confront the situation. Finding himself under siege by Oxford’s Evangelicals coupled with a financial revolt that could have deep-sixed the C of E, he forced Canon Jeffrey John to back down. The Bishops of Reading and Southwark were outraged, but Evangelicals' new found muscle won the day.     The INDIAN PRIMATE came out slamming same-sex blessings. The Most Rev. K. J. Samuel wrote saying, attempting to bless and affirm behaviours that are proscribed by the Scriptures is a mistake. It is wrong. It is sin. Archbishop Samuel, who could not be with his fellow Primates in Brazil, wrote praising the efforts of his fellow Primate Drexel Gomez (West Indies) for his study True Union in the Body? condemning such blessings, and warned of schism and broken communion if acted upon.     LAY CELEBRATION IN 2008 will not usurp the authority of the bishops. A report coming out of the meeting of Anglican Primates that a parallel congress of international Anglican laity will meet with the Lambeth Conference of Bishops in 2008, that would mute their ecclesiastical authority, were wildly exaggerated. Behind the idea was Canon John Peterson, the ultra-liberal secretary general of the Anglican Consultative Council (ACC) the fourth arm of the Anglican Communion. The idea of an international lay congress to run in parallel with the 2008 Lambeth arose at the Lambeth Conference in June 1998 following the vote by bishops overwhelmingly opposed to homosexual behavior.     It was viewed as an overwhelming defeat by the liberals, especially Canon Peterson who had been guaranteeing Western liberals that he would keep a decision off the agenda. Angered by the vote, Peterson told his Western paymasters and friends that never again would he let that happen, and he would do everything in his power to prevent such a re-enactment or vote on sexuality issues taking place again. He came up with the idea of generous lay involvement, the theory being that certain lay people would be invited to tell their stories and overwhelmingly destroy the ecclesiastical power of the bishops if things should be brought to a vote. The idea died.     IN AN INTERVIEW WITH ARCHBISHOP BENJAMIN NZIMBI OF KENYA the new Archbishop who took over from the popular and outspoken Archbishop David Gitari, told Virtuosity that the issue of theological education raised by the Primates would result in his people going to seminaries which were sound and balanced theologically, because we would like to have the church continue as one holy, catholic and apostolic church.     A SAME-SEX RITE was authorized in the Diocese of New Westminster with Ingham’s blessing in complete disregard to Primates Pastoral Letter news. He authorized the rite to take place at St. Margaret’s parish in East Vancouver. The in your face act was in total defiance of both the 1998 Lambeth resolution on human sexuality and the recent Primates Pastoral Letter out of Gramado, Brazil which said no to such actions. Clergy in six parishes within the Diocese of New Westminster were authorized to perform the rite of blessing of committed same sex unions.   And then it happened. A same-sex blessing took place at St. Margaret Cedar Cottage. Two men, Kelly and Michael, dressed in identical black suits wearing white shirts, and corsages, fulfilled the promise of a rite approved by the majority of the Diocese of New Westminster and authorized by New Westminster. Ingham declared open war against the Primates.     The actions of Ingham roused the concern of the Archbishop of Canterbury Dr. Rowan Williams, who, when he learned of the Vancouver bishop’s actions to allow a same sex blessing to occur hard on the heels of the Primates meeting, expressed sadness at Ingham’s actions and publicly rebuked him. Ingham’s green light to allow this blessing to take place reverberated around the Anglican Communion.     The Primate of Uganda, Archbishop Livingstone Mpalanyi-Nkoyoyo, described the Canadian bishop as a rebel who would be banned from his province, adding: He needs to repent. His teaching is heretical. The Primate of the West Indies, Archbishop Drexel Gomez, said: I am very disturbed and upset. I will be in consultation with some of the primates over the next few days, but it’s clear to me that there’s going to be some kind of dislocation. Archbishop Gomez said Bishop Ingham should not be invited to the 2008 Lambeth Conference, the 10-yearly council of Anglican bishops, because he is now outside the flock.     THIRTEEN CANADIAN BISHOPS promptly condemned the bishop’s action breaking communion with him. They spoke out for Anglican unity and against same-sex blessings in New Westminster. We are sure that most clergy and congregations will remain faithful to Scripture, to our Constitution and Disciplines, and to the Resolution of the Global Anglican Bishops at the most recent Lambeth Conference. We will work to keep the maximum degree of unity possible, with and between churches. Any bishops and clergy that do proceed will be breaking communion with large portions of the Anglican world, and will have impaired standing in the worldwide communion.     Archbishop Michael Peers, Primate of the Anglican Church of Canada expressed dismay by the decision of the synod and said he was convinced that it should not have been implemented.     REFORMED EPISCOPAL CHURCH PRESIDING BISHOP, Leonard Riches wrote a letter stressing evangelism, church planting to the Anglican primates on behalf of some ten jurisdictions representing some 300 participating in the U.S. Anglican Congress, in Atlanta, Georgia. Out of that meeting was forged a new paradigm of inter communion relationships. A smaller Task Force had met in Atlanta on April 28 and 29, 2003, to undertake the effort of carrying our purpose forward. That purpose is expressed in the Atlanta Covenant, a document which emerged from the December, 2002 gathering.   We are committed, without reservation, to the ultimate authority of Holy Scripture, to the teachings of the historic Ecumenical Creeds, and to the Thirty-Nine Articles of Religion. In the sessions of our Task Force, a clear consensus emerged that priority in our efforts should be devoted to the work of evangelism, church planting, and Christian formation. Another gathering in the fall of this year in order gave further substance to the vision.     In an article in the SCIENCE section of TIME magazine titled, What Makes You Who You Are, the writers argued that biology was not destiny. We can no longer argue that genes are immutable things handed down from our parents like Moses stone tablets, but are active participants in our lives, designed to take their cues from everything that happens to us from the moment of our conception. This one sentence was compelling; You will have to enter a world in which your genes are not puppet masters pulling the strings of your behavior... homosexuals take note. Behavior can change...it is a matter of choice, not a matter of plumbing. And right now The Episcopal Church along with a number of mainline denominations is making a choice to commit collective spiritual suicide on the phallic cross of their own sexual desires.     FAITHFUL ECUSA EPISCOPAL LAITY signed a petition saying that the overwhelming majority of Episcopalians were concerned over a resolution that would be considered at the 2003 General Convention in August calling for development of new rites for blessing homosexual relationships; and with continuing unilateral acts of blessing such relationships and ordaining non celibate single persons outside of marriage while General Convention debated the issues.     They asked that deputies and bishops to General Convention respect the 2003 House of Bishops Theology Committee Report and reject Resolution C005 calling for the blessing of homosexual relationships; and that ECUSA’s bishops immediately suspend all acts of same-sex blessings and ordinations of non celibate single persons outside of marriage, thereby creating an incentive for the Church to engage in further examination and open discussion of homosexuality and the social and Church wide impact of this proposed action.     END OF PART THREE

By David W. Virtue     Frank Griswold continued to put his foot in his mouth, this time the boot belonged to former President George W. Bush who took an implied swing at Frank Griswold in a brief speech about the 15 billion dollars the United States, courtesy of the American taxpayer, will pour into fighting global AIDS. Two US presidents had now publicly smacked a sitting Presiding Bishop of the Episcopal Church - the first in recorded history.   In order to do damage control for his outrageous remarks, Griswold tried to spin his own words, and in private correspondence to President Bush wrote; My comments were taken out of a larger context and had to do with my international travels as Presiding Bishop and my opportunities to meet with bishops and archbishops in other part of our worldwide Anglican Communion many in countries overwhelmed by poverty and disease.     Lies and nonsense. If he was so misunderstood, why didn’t he return President George Herbert Bush’s phone call to his New York office? He didn’t. Griswold said he was out of the country and couldn’t return the call. No call forwarding at 815? Aware that he had blown it, Griswold wrote a form letter to all who expressed outrage at him saying, These are anxious days as war with Iraq is an ever-present possibility and our economy causes grave concern. We are profoundly aware of our personal and collective vulnerabilities. Only his revisionist pals bought that line.   Two bishops, The Rt. Rev. Claude E. Payne (Texas) and the Rt. Rev. Don A. Wimberly wrote saying that, while many have taken offense at Bishop Griswold’s rhetoric, no one is compelled to agree with him totally or at all. He followed his conscience in making the remarks. Some conscience.     Episcopalians for Traditional Faith urged Griswold to apologize for his anti-American slurs saying he had embarrassed Episcopalians everywhere. His anti-American comments are entirely inappropriate for someone who owes his position and good fortune to the very nation he publicly rebukes. Instead of defending the Faith against those who hate us, he seems reluctant even to mention that faith, said Jan Mahood president of  ETF.   The American Anglican Council (AAC) emerged as the organization of choice for Evangelical Episcopalians in 2003 and quickly voiced its support for Bush’s pledge of funds to combat AIDS on the African Continent and in the Caribbean.     The British-based CHURCH SOCIETY took another swing at the Archbishop of Canterbury warning of the threat of ‘false teachers’ in the church. We are confident that if false teaching is refuted by our appointed leaders then the pressure that exists to seek alternative oversight will evaporate. Last year, the Church Society criticized the archbishop himself for false teaching.     And some 30 US denominations agreed in a proposal to create the broadest alliance of Christians ever formed in this country. The steering committee of the budding effort, tentatively called Christian Churches Together in the U.S.A. invited a wide range of national church bodies and agencies with five segments of U.S. Christianity, listed in the plan as Evangelical/Pentecostal, Historic protestant, Orthodox, Racial/Ethnic and Roman Catholic. The Catholic Church and most evangelicals and Pentecostals do not belong to the National Council of Churches, now the largest U.S. ecumenical group but in serious decline. There was one sticking point: The nation’s largest Protestant denomination, the Southern Baptist Convention, was reluctant to join; though it had an observer at the meeting. The alliance gathered groups that believe in the Lord Jesus Christ as God and savior according to the Scriptures and worship and serve One God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit.     In Pittsburgh, the Bishop, Robert Duncan announced that Trinity Cathedral was in serious financial troubled describing the situation as bleak to alarming and declared it a transitional parish, firing most of the staff. The Dean, the Very Rev. Richard P. Pocalyko resigned. There were no plans to replace him.     In other Episcopal news the Dean of the University of the South’s School of Theology in Sewanee, The Very Rev. Guy F. Lytle III , an orthodox theologian, stepped down as dean over allegations that he sexually harassed a student but would remain on the school’s faculty after taking a leave of absence. This action against the dean subsequently turned out to be more political and theological in nature with the Dean coming under fire because he was orthodox in faith and morals, facing revolt from a growing liberal/revisionist faculty.     The San Francisco parish of St. John’s, a predominantly gay parish, was torn apart by ecstasy-fueled rave dances and reached a new ecstasy level with Episcopal Bishop William Swing accepting the resignation of its rector, the Rev. Kevin Pearson, and ending the Divine Rhythm Society’s all night dance and drug-related antics. The vestry resigned as well. The bishop said he was especially concerned about parish drug use in light of the recent deaths of two participants at an unrelated New Year’s Eve dance party at the Cow Palace. The rector reportedly said, We use entheogens to reach for God, not to get high. Really.     In the DIOCESE OF PENNSYLVANIA, the prestigious and venerable 217-year old Episcopal Academy announced it would have workshops on homosexual acceptance, with the tacit approval of the head teacher Mr. Hamilton Clark and the Bishop of Pennsylvania Charles E. Bennison. A national homosexual organization called GLSEN - Gay and Lesbian Straight Education Network which actively promotes homosexuality was doing so right inside the Episcopal Academy on Philadelphia’s pampered mainline.     The Episcopal Church’s Executive Council convened Jan. 27-30 in the Dominican Republic got into power issues with a Separation of Powers resolution passed that would keep separate fiduciary and executive responsibilities assigned to Executive Council.     At issue was the sudden collapse of negotiations to relocate the Church Center from its current mid-Manhattan location to the campus of the General Theological Seminary about 20 blocks further southwest. Frank Griswold was on the hot seat and in deep trouble because he was told to implement and facilitate the move to General Theological Seminary and at the last moment brushed it aside for what he calls his missional objectives. What happened was that inside policy wonks at 815 could see their power evaporate in a puff of smoke if a move was made and Griswold nixed it. It was an enormous power struggle with Griswold on the hot seat.     A group calling itself Claiming the Blessing a coalition of pansexual forces announced it was building a third of a million-dollar war chest to promote liturgical rites for same-sex blessings at the upcoming GC2003. This was just the beginning a campaign to promote sodomy at all levels in the church, with the triumph of V. Gene Robinson’s consecration as the next Bishop of New Hampshire.     In the Church of England the Queen approved the nomination of Reverend Canon Dr Nicholas Thomas Wright, Canon Theologian of Westminster Abbey, to be the next Bishop of Durham. Tom Wright, as he is better known to most Anglicans is a prolific author and debater, who appears regularly on the circuit defending orthodoxy with rival and debating pal Marcus Borg over whether the New Testament’s accounts of a divine Jesus were myth or history.     And in Raleigh, NC, St. Andrew’s pled her case in front of the NC Court of Appeals for their property.  ECUSA Bishop Clifton Daniel III, of East Carolina wanted the property and spared no effort or money, to take it back from the Rev. King Cole and his AMIA followers. The bishop ultimately won, but got a virtually empty parish for his troubles.     The new ARCHBISHOP OF CANTERBURY gave an interview to the London Telegraph and said basically No to same sex blessings.     Questioned on why some evangelicals seem to be very worried about him and did he understand why? The archbishop opined that underlying problem was that they had difficulty with what they thought he believed about Scripture and Revelation.     Because I have emphasized in some of what I have written the sheer difficulty of talking about God, they have thought I can’t have a doctrine of Revelation, I must be agnostic. I would want to put it exactly the other way around. It is precisely that it is because it is God that is revealed in Jesus Christ that you would expect some difficulties in talking about it.     Questioned on his left-wing social commitments Williams had this to say: My Left-wing commitments have come from two main impulses which have been deep anxiety and unhappiness and distaste about the individualism which has sometimes characterized the Right in the last two or three decades and something which I suppose does come from  deep in the Welsh non-conformist tradition, not pacifism exactly, but a deep-rooted internationalism which makes me extremely skeptical about war as a solution to international problems.     Heir to the throne Prince Charles said he must be Defender of Faith, and not simply Defender of The Faith. His remarriage was also not a done-deal and his living in sin was found to be something of an impediment to orthodox folks who felt that his living arrangement with Camella Parker Bowles still rated a concern.     ECUSA’s Integrity organization for homosexual acceptance found its counterpart in an organization called ‘Changing Attitudes’ set up in the Church of England. An Anglican priest Colin Coward and claims 200 Anglican members established the group. They are being funded by charity money raised from the National Lottery and ‘Comic Relief’, a telethon program which was originally set up to raise money for children dying from hunger in Africa.     World Anglican leaders condemned the war on Iraq stepping up to the plate to condemn the US going to war unless sanctioned by the United Nations. Those criticizing US foreign policy were American, England, Canadian and Australian leaders who are, for the most part, theologically and socially liberal. The UN has become the new secular god to which everyone must bow regardless of its morality. It also signaled a complete handover of moral decision making and authority to this organization known more for compromise than legitimate peace.  ECUSA’s Peacenik Presiding Bishop told The Chicago Sun-Times  that we are in a state of corporate desolation. Speaking at an Episcopal  conference called Will Our Faith Have children? Griswold opined that the only sense of community we have now is shared fear or anxiety. He asked rhetorically, Will our children have a world?     To keep the pressure for peace on the front burner, the new Bishop of Washington, John Chane zipped across the Atlantic to have a chat with British Prime Minister Tony Blair to try and persuade him to see the peaceful light and to help our President see the same light also. The light bulb he shone had low wattage. The UK and US went to war anyway and won it.     In the DIOCESE OF LONG ISLAND Bishop Orris Walker tried to secretly reinstate a priest, one Lloyd Andries, formerly of St. Gabriel’s, Brooklyn who was exposed in a 1996 Penthouse story, The Boys from Brazil. This story revealed a secret cadre of gay and bisexual cross- dressing Episcopal priests whose private lives included the most bizarre rituals imaginable and prompted the priest to resign from his parish. Andries even married one of his Brazilian boys. The bishop wanted him back as a supply priest and got the Diocesan Standing Committee in secret, to make it happen. It all fell apart when a number of diocesan priests got wind of it and Walker could not get enough bishops to sign on to his stupid idea. It died. Four contiguous dioceses had to give their approval for the reinstatement  with Bishop Daniel Herzog (Diocese of Albany) refusing to do so.     And in the DIOCESE OF OREGON one of the candidates looking to be the next bishop said he went around with a ventriloquist Dummy called Dexter to enhance his sermons.   Being light in the loafers as a bishop is one thing, and acting like a dummy is quite another; the marvelous feat is managing to be both.     NORTH OF THE US BORDER in Canada talks broke down between The Diocese of New Westminster and representatives of the eight orthodox parishes. Revisionist Bishop Michael Ingham blamed the dissident parishes saying the parishes wanted to talk about separation, not reconciliation. Not true said representatives of the parishes, that interpretation was entirely false. But a group of clergy and lay leaders from the DIOCESE OF ALGOMA in the Province of Ontario sent a letter to Bishop Ingham and the lay leadership of the Diocese of New Westminster arguing that marriage was strictly for heterosexuals and the Diocese and bishop had no business changing the church’s teaching. The eight parishes then hosted Chuck Murphy, Bishop of the Anglican Mission in America to Vancouver, and several of the ACiNW priests were in Pawleys Island, SC at the AMIA headquarters to listen and talk things over at their annual gathering. AMIA leaders came in support of Bishop Buckle with an oversight resolution arguing that overlapping jurisdictions within the Communion were a good thing. FORWARD IN FAITH stepped up to the plate to stand with the eight orthodox parishes commending them for their faithful commitment to Biblical Faith. We see this action as being completely in line with the call for alternative oversight from the Lambeth Conference of 1998, and with that of the Primates’ Meeting of 2001. We urge all bishops, especially in the USA and in Canada, to support Bishop Buckle in his stand, they said.     THE ENTHRONEMENT of the 104th Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams, took place at Canterbury Cathedral, England, on February 27 at 3 p.m. beginning a new era following the Evangelical George Carey. A demonstration by a number of British, Canadian and US orthodox priests was held in support of traditional teaching. Several priests wore black armbands outside Canterbury Cathedral in protest. It was an action to show positive support for traditional teaching rather than as a protest or demonstration since the latter automatically seems to portray those protesting in a negative light, said the dissenters.     While the new Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr. Rowan Williams was being enthroned  another drama was being played out down the street. A number of Primates including the Archbishop of West Indies, The Most Revd Drexel Wellington Gomez, the Archbishop of Central Africa; The Most Revd Bernard Amos Malango, the Archbishop of Kenya; The Most Revd Benjamin M. P. Nzimbi, the Archbishop of Congo, The Most Revd Dr. Fidele Balufuga Dirokpa; the Archbishop of Rwanda, The Most Revd Emmanuel Musaba Kolini and the Archbishop of South East Asia, the Most Revd Datuk Yong Ping Chung met to discuss the unfolding situation in the Diocese of New Westminster where eight parishes are under siege from New Westminster Bishop Michael Ingham.     These parishes are being asked to violate their consciences and Holy Scripture by having to agree with their bishop on blessing same-sex unions. They won’t. There were in fact two meetings; one in a hotel and the other at St. Mary Bredin Church in Canterbury, and the sole question on their minds was how to provide alternative oversight for the ‘New Westminster 8.’ Also present was a member of the Anglican Communion in New Westminster (ACiNW) Paul Carter who was seeking to get the involvement of the Primates.     As it turned out, an historic breakthrough came in the person of the Bishop of the Yukon, the Rt. Rev. Terence O. Buckle who swept down from the North like a knight in shining armor to offer alternative Episcopal oversight to these New Westminster parishes, and he did so with the full support of these overseas Primates. Bishop Buckle submitted an offer to the Bishop of New Westminster to provide alternative episcopal oversight to the parishes of the ACiNW, and to other orthodox parishes in the diocese that may wish to join the ACiNW in the future. But this went over like a lead balloon and Michael Ingham immediately fought back saying he would inhibit Buckle if he so much as stepped foot in the Diocese of New Westminster.     IN a report from England the ax was out for bishops in the C of E facing catastrophic decline. Bishops were being urged to resign over the Church’s decline with a report saying that its decline is far greater than its leadership is willing to admit. It says that the Church’s collapse is across the board and calls on the bishops to take responsibility and go.     IN SOUTH AFRICA, the Dean of St. George’s Cathedral in Cape Town came out of the closet and declared himself a homosexual. The Very Reverend Rowan Smith said he hoped and prayed that one-day he and his partner would be able to enter into a homosexual relationship blessed by the Church of the Province of Southern Africa (CPSA). This is the first known case of a high cleric in the Anglican Church on the African continent being outed, and in a country which has the highest incidence of AIDS in Africa and in the most liberal African province.     SEWANEE SEMINARY was exposed as dysfunctional by Virtuosity with an independent report saying the faculty was so divided there seemed little hope of the institution emerging from its problems with any resolution in the foreseeable future. At the center of the storm, for the past 11 years, was the strong, able figure of Dean Guy Lytle III, who had come under repeated hostile fire from a number of theologically liberal faculty who have wanted him removed from the University of the South’s seminary because of his orthodox views. Seminary leaders started to spin my story on their dysfunction. They circled the wagons putting out this statement to all Faculty and Staff of the University of the South saying: We, the faculty and senior administrators of the School of Theology of the University of the South, wish to make known the following: We are aware of fallacious and ill-informed criticisms of the faculty both as a whole and as individuals.  We regard such comments as a calumny that applies to all of us.   While making no claim to perfection, we affirm our ability to work together and celebrate our differences as expressions of the vitality of thought required by scholarship and the spirit of inquiry preserved through Sewanee’s rich tradition of academic  freedom.     FIRST TALKS aimed at healing the breach between The Reformed Episcopal Church, The Anglican Province of America and The Anglican Church in America began, with news that Donald Perschall, Presiding Bishop of the American Anglican Church (AAC) had gone over to the Episcopal Church to become rector of Holy Trinity Episcopal Church in Mount Vernon, Illinois.     But homosexual misbehavior continued on the radar screen of ECUSA and in Texas the Episcopal Church joined with a number of homosexual advocacy groups to seek repeal of the state of Texas’s anti-sodomy statute in a case before the U.S. Supreme Court. Griswold filed an amici (friend of the court) brief on behalf of a Texas man accused of violating the state’s statute prohibiting homosexual conduct, the Episcopal News Service reported March 7. The matter has become a cause celebre among homosexual activists.     THE ANGLICAN COMMUNION continued to roil from crisis to crisis. From the UK to Cyprus, from Australia to Vancouver, from Tennessee to Pennsylvania the Anglican Communion twisted and turned.     IN CYPRUS, delegates from around the Communion meeting at the Anglican Communion Mission Organizations heard The Revd. Riaj Jarjour, General Secretary of the Middle East Council of Churches, remind delegates that the mission of Jesus was to restore the dignity and worth of all and set free a groaning creation. We need a mission to Muslims, not to bring people to Christ but to proclaim Christ, Jesus the peacemaker, Jesus who came with justice and Jesus the reconciler.     IN AUSTRALIA the new Dean of Sydney’s St. Andrew’s Anglican Cathedral, Philip Jensen, made a striking debut. In his inaugural sermon at the cathedral, Dean Phillip Jensen - brother to the Anglican Archbishop of Sydney, Dr. Peter Jensen - attacked what he saw as excessive relativism in the media treatment of Hinduism, Judaism, Islam and Christianity. They can’t all be right, he argued. The media called him a Fundamentalist and out of step with contemporary thought.   AND IN VANCOUVER, the ‘Dissident 8’ received public support from the American Anglican Council (AAC) the evangelical wing of The Episcopal Church USA. They came out with a statement applauding the Bishop of Yukon (Canada) Terence Buckle for offering sustained pastoral care to New Westminster parishes. The parishes voted overwhelmingly to accept Yukon Bishop Terry Buckle’s offer of Alternative Episcopal Oversight. The decision allowed Buckle to act as an alternative bishop with full jurisdiction for those parishes that were effectively orphaned by the decision of their diocese’s governing body and Bishop in June 2002 to bless same-sex unions. The congregations - all of them members of the Anglican Communion in New Westminster (ACiNW) coalition -- also approved a motion offering to enter a discussion with the Bishop of New Westminster, the Rt. Rev. Michael Ingham, to implement the plan with a view to maintaining peace, harmony and goodwill between the parties. The motion passed with an average 98% majority in each of the parishes, including Canada’s largest Anglican church, St. John’s (Shaughnessy), as well as all the Chinese congregations in the Diocese. But Bishop Michael Ingham  told the CBC that there was no change in his position to accept such oversight. He threatened to make a presentment against Bishop Buckle or anyone else who intervened in his diocese.     AND IN PENNSYLVANIA Bishop Charles E. Bennison won another round in his fight to take back parishes that wanted to uphold the catholic faith. St. James the Less in Philadelphia got plastered by the judge and the parish was told it had to turn over its property and the rector leave the parish manse to the bishop, who can then put in his own vestry and rector. The parish appealed but by year’s end they were still meeting in their church, though their future remains uncertain.   THE EPISCOPAL CHURCH’S wish list to double the church by 20/20 came under scrutiny by Virtuosity when it was learned that some $2 million was being thrown at this ministry to make this fantasy come true. The Presiding Bishop Frank Griswold, earmarked $2 million dollars to address 20/20 energies. That’s a lot of expensive energies. The national church’s budget, all $125 million plus dollars will also provide funds for a national identity campaign with a bunch of ads telling people who we are corporately.     The HOUSE OF BISHOPS issued a pastoral letter on the pending war with Iraq expressing unhappiness at the Bush administration, urging peace and prayer all around.     As your bishops, we commit ourselves to adopt a discipline of fasting and prayer for the return of peace.     But an editorial in ANGLICANS ONLINE a news service with 200,000 readers with a strong liberal bent, made the observation about the war in Iraq which they opposed saying; We see the first as proof that Satan is real and present, and the second as proof that God is real and present. Such is our life and our world: an omnipresent God and an omnipresent Satan.     The HOUSE OF BISHOPS THEOLOGY COMMITTEE issued a report which said no to same-sex rites. The committee, which consisted of thirteen persons including six bishops and seven academic theologians representing diverse theological viewpoints, wrote that while they acknowledged deep diversity and division over homosexuality in the church, it was imperative that the Episcopal Church refrain from any attempt to settle the matter legislatively.     Archbishop Williams in a pastoral letter to Anglican Primates expressing his concerns about the conflict in Iraq and his hope for a positive future for the region. In his letter to the Primates of the Anglican Church’s 38 Provinces, Dr Williams spoke of his concern for Christian communities of the Middle East, and of his prayers for them and their neighbours of other faiths. Acknowledging Iraq as the homeland of Abraham, Dr Williams also voiced hopes for reconciliation and justice in the region.     FORWARD IN FAITH called on Griswold to provide episcopal pastoral care for the orthodox in ECUSA. In a letter they called upon him to use his considerable influence to bring this proposal to fruition. However, we would be less than forthright with you, and fail in our responsibility to those we represent, if we did not go on to say that the House of Bishops’ proposal for ‘supplemental episcopal pastoral care’ seems to us to fall far short of the ‘appropriate episcopal care’ which the Communion has promised and our constituency requires. The issue of pastoral care became a recurring issue throughout the year.     A British bishop broke rank to back the Iraqi war. The Bishop of Chester, the Rt Rev Peter Forster, lent his unqualified support to military action, saying it was morally and legally justifiable. His statement echoed comments by the Bishop of Hereford, the Rt Rev John Oliver, that military action had become the least morally repugnant option. Support from the senior clerics cheered No 10.     Sydney Archbishop Peter Jensen called for a speedy and just resolution to the Iraqi War saying the outbreak of war in Iraq constituted a solemn moment, with many dangers and threats and potential for great human suffering.     And UGANDAN Archbishop Mpalanyi Nkoyooyo of the Anglican Church of Uganda and Simeon Kayiwa, leader of the National Fellowship of the Born Again Churches of Uganda, said the attack on Iraq was justified. Saddam Hussein has been a dictator for too long, committing atrocities even on his own people, Nkoyooyo said. He also said the Government was right to support America.     The bishops Gift of Sexuality Theology report of the House of Bishops was welcomed by the AAC saying that though we don’t agree with every element of this report, it is apparent that the Bishops have offered measured and thoughtful recommendations intended to prevent schism in both the Episcopal Church and Anglican Communion, said the Very Rev. David C. Anderson.  Episcopalians United under the leadership of the Rev. Todd H. Wetzel also supported the findings of the HOB Theology report.     The UNITED ANGLICAN CHURCH that had earlier set about merging with the Traditional Anglican Communion (TAC) decided that such a merger was not possible. The UAC left the TAC citing TAC’s collaborative decision making.     And to round off the mad month of March, Pennsylvania Bishop Charles Bennison wrote in the Pennsylvania Episcopalian that Jesus was Sinner. The revisionist bishop who had denied a number of basic doctrines of the Christian Faith, said that while Jesus forgives sins, He acknowledges his own sin. His call is to preach repentance and forgiveness.     Bennison, who supplanted former Bishop Newark Bishop Jack Spong as ECUSA’s leading revisionist had also written a Visigoth Rite of marriage for both heterosexuals and homosexuals had also failed to affirm basic doctrines of the Christian Faith such as the bodily resurrection of Jesus, the uniqueness of Jesus Christ as the only way of obtaining salvation, the authority of Scripture and more.     END OF PART TWO

I sense an impending train wreck the size of which this part of the Anglican Communion has not seen. The Rt. Rev. Peter Beckwith, Bishop of Springfield   By David W. Virtue     It was a cataclysmic year in the life of the Anglican Communion.     The new 104th Archbishop of the Anglican Communion was enthroned in Canterbury in March; an emergency meeting of the Primates was held at Lambeth later in the year, the consecration of a non-celibate homosexual to The Episcopal Church took place, the almost consecration of a homosexual canon theologian to The Church of England was sabotaged at the last minute; some 3,000 orthodox Episcopalians met in Dallas to plot a new direction for themselves, it all ending with the formation of a Network of Anglican Dioceses and Congregations that will challenge The Episcopal Church’s very control of its people. There has never been a year like it in the history of the Anglican Communion or The Episcopal Church. The entire Communion hovered on the very brink of schism, with cries of outrage from Global South Primates and bishops as they viewed their Western counterparts doing and saying things that violated the very core of Anglican doctrine and practice, in fact the very truth of what it means to be a Christian.     The newly elected Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr. Rowan Williams found himself floundering in a sea of controversy over sexuality issues that will require Solomonic wisdom to resolve if the Communion is to stay together. He would not offer a clear biblical word rejecting sex outside of marriage, preferring to set in motion an Eames Commission report he hoped by Oct. 2004 will bring all the parties together at a common table. He might well be whistling Dixie.     THE YEAR 2003 began ominously enough with word being declared that The Episcopal Church was going through a dark night of the soul with The Anglican Church in Canada also being torn apart by sin and bad theology,     In January a radical bid for alternative Episcopal oversight brought two British evangelical groups REFORM and CHURCH SOCIETY together saying they wanted pastoral care from someone other than Rowan Williams to reign over them because he had knowingly ordained a -homosexual and they called on Peter Jensen the Archbishop of Sydney to give them cover.     The Archbishop of Canterbury was not amused by the actions of these two groups.     But in the DIOCESE OF PENNSYLVANIA, the bishop Charles Bennison, was thwarted yet again after an orthodox priest he wanted out of one of his parishes went off to Africa to face trial and was promptly sent back to resume his ministry. Fr. Eddy Rix, 32, priest in charge at All Saints’, Wynnewood pled guilty to functioning as a priest without a license in the Diocese of Pennsylvania, got a slap on the wrist, after being allowed to preach in the African diocese and then ordered home to pick up where he left off, much to the chagrin of Bennison.     As a sign of the times another orthodox priest, the Rev. Frederick C. Watson resigned and went off to the Russian Orthodox church fed up with the ECUSA’s new found religion. The Archbishop of Canterbury took a major hit from Mark Steyn in the Sunday Telegraph saying that his criticism of the war on Iraq as utterly immoral showed he was himself morally flawed. Williams spent a good part of the year making statements making nice with what he generously called moderate Islamic groups who didn’t really want to commit Jihad against the West.     THE AFRICAN ANGLICAN CHURCH, one of the last bastions of religious conservatism, reluctantly prepared for battle against Western-imposed liberalism. On a continent where homosexuality is not only morally unacceptable, but often also illegal, the possibility that Dr Rowan Williams, the Archbishop of Canterbury, would want to ordain practicing homosexuals prompted undisguised horror. As abhorrent as female circumcision is to you in the West, that is how abhorrent homosexuality is to the African mind, said one Kenyan bishop. If they go ahead and do it [ordain homosexuals], the African Church will react, and will react negatively. Homosexuality is unbiblical and unnatural.     That was just for openers, the pressure and heat mounted ominously throughout the year.     And back in the DIOCESE OF PENNSYLVANIA, Bennison failed to dislodge Father David Moyer from the rectorship of Church of the Good Shepherd parish, or even to eliminate the parish as a vital force in the Philadelphia area, or worldwide.     Moyer became answerable to an archbishop in Africa with the feud drawing international attention after the ultra-liberal bishop officially defrocked the orthodox priest in September for defying his authority. Father Moyer and his supporters, however, worked out a plan to foil the action: Within minutes of the defrocking, he was made a priest in the Province of Central Africa, then was transferred to the oversight of the bishop of Pittsburgh. Father Moyer continued to function as pastor of the Rosemont parish, an unprecedented situation that pleased fellow traditionalists in the Anglican Communion but confounded Episcopal strategists. By year’s end he was still safely ensconced in his parish with his attorney John H. Lewis, Jr., declaring that the crisis had passed.     Lewis has said that Bennison had become a prisoner of his own wrongful actions. Since he claims to have deposed Father Moyer, he cannot bring any new church proceedings against Father Moyer since that would require him to admit that Father Moyer remains a priest in good standing, an admission that would also require Bishop Bennison to admit that his deposition was wrongful and invalid. QED     Later in January, America’s premier theologian Robert Jensen bluntly declared at a conference of Ecumenical scholars in Charleston, SC that included a goodly number of Episcopalians and Anglicans that men and women who indulge in homoerotic relationships should not be ordained. Frank Griswold was not amused.     A position paper signed by four theologians arguing that General Convention had no authority to approve of blessings for same-sex couples provoked a firestorm of opinion from across the Internet. Virtuosity wrote at the time, no single issue outside the ongoing struggle with homosexuality in ECUSA has caused so much discussion to erupt in recent memory. Should orthodox and evangelical Episcopalians stay or leave ECUSA? We would recognize such an exceptional action as being unconstitutional, declared Dr. Paul Zahl, Dean of the Cathedral Church of the Advent in Birmingham.     It was also a year in which the Presiding Bishop of the Episcopal Church Frank Griswold took more hits than a Mafia foot soldier in a Sopranos sitcom.   His Soutane attire was splattered with the blood of betrayal, broken promises, outright lies, distortions and venality, taken to a level unheard of and unprecedented in the entire history of The Episcopal Church.     In the first of many missteps Griswold told Bishop Bennison that his going after Fr. Moyer was utterly unacceptable and to help his theologically pluriform mind he invoked the thoroughly deceased Sufi poet Rumi inviting all parties, including the Standing Committee of the Diocese of Pennsylvania to a field beyond wrongdoing and right doing for a pow wow. There was no meeting. Absolute, non-pluriform right and wrong continued to haunt the Presiding Bishop throughout the year.     Also haunting The Episcopal Church was the Anglican Mission in America (AMIA) whose numbers only increased throughout the year as they slowly gobbled up ripe Episcopal churches fed up with ECUSA’s theological and moral drift. Some 600 met in Pawley’s Island, South Carolina for what has now become one of the most significant gatherings of Anglicans on this continent. A few short years ago the Anglican Mission in America (AMIA) was but an idea in the minds of its founders, a group of men grown disenchanted by the growing apostasy in The Episcopal Church USA. Today, all that has changed. With some 12,000 followers in more than 100 parishes, the AMIA has become a significant witness in the worldwide Anglican Communion to which they have a formal relationship, and a challenge to liberal and orthodox bishops in the ECUSA.     January was also the month that saw two bishops, one a Canadian and the other an American lashing out at Anglican INTERNET communication; with one bishop, Michael Ingham (New Westminster) recently calling it a medium of abuse. The other bishop, Charles E. Bennison (Pennsylvania) filed a motion to prevent an Anglo-Catholic priest and his attorney from revealing to VIRTUOSITY what is in the secret documents about the inhibition of Fr. David Moyer that Bennison had been ordered to produce. Bennison cited VIRTUOSITY as a primary source of his irritation over revealing what really happened in the Bennison attack on Fr. Moyer. The Presiding Bishop of the Episcopal Church also denounced Internet stories as full of distortion and untrue and berated this journalist for using the Internet to reveal information about ECUSA he would prefer to have been kept secret. Virtuosity became the focus of their wrath throughout the year, as news of the church’s venality filtered out unspun around the Communion.     In other news it was declared that the last line in the sand had been drawn and Frank Griswold and ECUSA would be declared out of Communion if same-sex unions got passed GC2003. It was also the month that Dr. Louie Crew, ECUSA’s First Sodomite announced that he would seek the presidency of the House of Deputies in an attempt to unseat George Werner in an open vote at GC2003. As events turned out his attempt failed. But it did have the effect of keeping Werner’s feet to the revisionist fire, if he should suddenly decide to weaken and make nice with ECUSA’s orthodox. Crew was not without his strategy.     In the DIOCESE OF NEW YORK, the former Bishop of New York, Richard Grein suffered a setback in his legal fight with the Rev. Janet Kraft for throwing her out of Grace Church in Manhattan and placing his very close female friend Anne Richards in her place. The judge told Grein and his lawyers to settle the case because he had little chance of winning. Grein also got divorced. He was one of the most hateful bishops in ECUSA towards orthodox priests in his diocese. The Kraft case still remains unresolved.     In another sign of theological insanity, the DIOCESE OF NEW YORK sent a number of Episcopalians to rebuild a mosque in Kabul rather than preach the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ or to build a church so people could worship Jesus. Making nice with the enemy was more important than telling them the Good News about Jesus.     FORWARD IN FAITH, NORTH AMERICA, the traditionalist Anglo-Catholic arm of The ECUSA said they wanted to remain a part of the Episcopal Church. Be it resolved that the purpose of Forward in Faith, North America, is to uphold the historic Faith, Practice and Order of the Church Biblical, Apostolic and Catholic, and to resist all efforts to deviate from it. To this end, Forward in Faith, North America, seeks to minister pastorally and sacramentally to all who are faithful to the Anglican Way, both within the Episcopal Church and outside it, while working internationally and cooperatively for the creation of an orthodox Province of the Anglican Communion.     And Griswold told us all how embarrassed he was being an American because the nation wanted to go to war with Iraq. Many Episcopalians retorted that they felt embarrassed having Griswold as their Presiding Bishop. Former U. S. President George Herbert Bush, an Episcopalian, hammered Griswold for his recent anti-American comments. Griswold said he was ashamed of being an American and was tired of apologizing for being from the U.S. and for wanting war with Iraq, while Bush was not doing enough about the world’s starving. Bush senior lit into Griswold saying that he found Griswold’s rhetoric highly offensive and said Americans were among the most kind and generous, fairest nation in the world.     The Archbishop of Canterbury also took it on the chin from one of the Anglican Church’s senior Australian leaders. The archbishop of Sydney, Peter Jensen, on a preaching tour of England, called on Dr Williams, the leader of the worldwide Anglican Communion, to espouse the teaching of scripture and end his personal sympathy for homosexual couples. The Australian archbishop was the first senior bishop to voice concerns about Dr. Williams, after both the Church Society and Reform called on Dr Williams to step down even before his appointment as archbishop was confirmed.     In Southern Africa, Archbishop Njongonkulu Ndungane, called on Southern Africa’s 10 million baptized Anglicans to take a pro-homosexual line putting him at odds with the rest of the continent’s African bishops. Archbishop Ndungane circulated an eight-page discussion document on human sexuality. The document warned that, besides threatening the unity of the Anglican Communion, the matter of homosexuality was causing deep pain on both sides of the debate. The first step was to find common foundations. The rest of the African bishops did not agree. They didn’t like his foundations one little bit.     In yet another bit of singular madness, Bishop Bennison cited Hitler in criticizing African church growth. He told a reporter on National Public Radio that when it comes to the faith, millions of conservative African Christians are wrong. He likened their growth to Hitler and the Nazis. Bennison tried to backpedal but the damage was done. A Jewish lady who had worked for Archbishop Emmanuel Kolini in the Province of Rwanda, wrote saying she was so outraged she just couldn’t find the words to say how she felt. The statement he [Bennison] made is unbelievable no matter how he tries to correct himself, and he said it on national radio no less. Does he know that I, a Jew, have been serving alongside Archbishop Kolini for more than 15 years! The comparison between Hitler and Kolini is so far-fetched it is not even worth this email... Perhaps Bennison should read The Pink Swastika: Homosexuality in the Nazi Party, 4th edition, she wrote. Bennison spent a good deal of the year putting his foot in his mouth. By years’ end he was tasting leather.     Dr. Pam Darling, a leading Episcopal Church historian, and a member of the Pennsylvania Standing Committee, said in a Memorandum that Forward in Faith was manipulating past and present Archbishops of Canterbury over Fr. David Moyer, The Episcopal Church’s leading Anglo-Catholic cleric in his battle with Bishop Bennison. It was another attempt by a revisionist historian to spin the truth and shut down orthodoxy. Bennison had, in September 2002, fraudulently deposed Fr. Moyer after concealing from his Standing Committee a letter from Frank Griswold top back off. Fr. Moyer’s attorney’s filed a complaint in the civil court and the part and present Archbishops of Canterbury (as well as numerous other bishops) refused to recognize the deposition. Moyer was received into an African Diocese and then received by Bishop Robert Duncan of the Diocese of Pittsburgh. In 2003, he and his curate became canonically resident in African Dioceses.     But not to be entirely outdone, the former Archbishop of Canterbury Dr. George Carey got into an embarrassing contest of wills with US Secretary of State Colin Powell, in Switzerland. Following a speech by Powell on US foreign policy he took a question from the former Archbishop of Canterbury. Carey was diplomatically rude and insulting to the United States, bringing up the difference between soft (diplomatic/economic) and hard (military) power with an implied question as to whether the United States is capable of understanding the difference in today’s middle-eastern world. In the most diplomatic terms and manner, the good General skewered the former ABC, reminding him that United States has a clear understanding of hard and soft power since it has been militarily successful across the 20th Century and NEVER asked for anything from the countries that it liberated or conquered except for enough ground to bury its dead.     And in the DIOCESE OF MASSACHUSETTS pluriformity reigned supreme. A diversity in faith, unity in peace rally was held at which Quakers, Buddhists, and Muslim muezzin, swayed to the jazz arrangement of a Christian spiritual. Members of Massachusetts’ religious community gathered in the landmark Trinity Church where Episcopal Bishop Thomas Shaw ticked off a list of concerns he said the assembly fears more than Hussein, including the damage wrought by AIDS in Africa, environmental destruction, a deteriorating economy, and ‘‘how hated we are by so many of our brothers and sisters around the globe.’’ He echoed sentiments expressed by his close personal friend Frank Griswold.     Three dioceses held conventions in January, in which two, Newark and Washington upheld sodomite practices while Central Florida bucked the trend and called for more evangelism and mission outreach.     END OF PART ONE

by Toby Cohen http://www.religiousintelligence.org/ June 10th, 2010     Episcopal vacancies are opening up across the Church, and in the next few years the House of Bishops could have a very different complexion. With the Church teetering on the brink of some major changes, there is particular curiosity about the mentality of the new men under the mitres.     The Assistant Area Dean of Southampton, the Rev Canon Geoffrey Annas, was announced last week as the next Bishop of Stafford. As his new Diocesan Bishop, the Rt Rev John Gledhill, makes clear, Canon Annas has just the right sort of credentials: He has won the respect of the whole community and many attribute a drop in serious crime to the neighbourliness and vision of St Christopher’s [Thornhill, where he was made vicar in ‘94]He has overseen the establishment of the Southampton Street Pastors’ Scheme and a new Academy school, under the auspices of the Diocese and Oasis Trust. More recently he has been assistant Area Dean in the large Southampton Deanery, caring for clergy and lay leaders.     Canon Annas’ expertise in important frontline Church initiatives qualifies him well for service in any part of the organisation, as he acknowledges in an interview during his return to Lichfield last week, 25 years after his only previous visit there on a diocesan retreat.     My background has obviously been very much in ministry in the urban setting, but I spend a lot of time today with people in the rural setting and that’s been fascinating. The links between the two [are fascinating] as well. There’s not as much diversity between the two as people make out.     He will miss the people he has worked with in Southampton, but is confident in their ability to carry on the good work; he is aware of great achievements being made in Lichfield, but is confident in the call of God and the help of his supportive team.     So far there is little to distinguish him from the other humble and enthused servants of the Church who have been selected for elevation. But Canon Annas himself detects a shift: There’s a general change in culture at the moment. It’s not just in the Church, I think the result of the General Election is an indication that people generally are looking now more towards consensual ways forward rather than being competitive all the time.     We sometimes make the mistake that everyone wants something new but there’s a lot that’s good about the traditional ways we’ve always done things and it’s just about bringing the two together really, which is what I meant by the consensual thing.     That might not be the change others in the Church are talking about. And if they are talking about it at Synod this summer, they may have to look hard to find that spirit of consensus which the Archbishop of Canterbury was pleading for in February.     So how has that culture of consensus affected Canon Annas’ own stance on disputed issues?     I haven’t compromised at all, in that I am totally supportive of women bishops and I very much value the ministry of my female colleagues. And I look forward to the time when they exercise Episcopal ministry as well.     Although I’m 100 per cent behind the ordination of women to the episcopate, I’m also incredibly sensitive to those who find it difficult, and this is again where the consensual thing comes in. The last thing that I want is for anybody to feel alienated, I think the Church should be inclusive and so I think we have to work within that.     So perhaps traditionalists needn’t be too worried just yet. The new Bishop of Stafford joins the large gang of Church ‘liberals’ who believe in incremental development rather than table-turning reform. He plays the same line on gays: My feelings about openly gay clergy - I personally have no issues with that at all, but I think again like the ordination of women to the episcopate it’s something where there needs to be enormous sensitivity.     I’m not somebody who will overthrow rules and regulations for the sake of it, because I think if you do that you get chaos and anarchy, but I am somebody who will work to build a consensus to change rules and regulations and I would hope that in the future at some point people could be allowed to be true to themselves.       It is not a sin to be a homosexual, and that is very much the teaching of the Church of England. What the Church does teach is that actually whether you’re heterosexual or gay, outside of a committed married relationship, there should be no physical sexual activity.       Well, as you realise, unless you’re saying to me that gay people should marry, which I personally wouldn’t agree with, you’re going to deprive gay people of that possibility of having a physical relationship, which to my mind seems contrary to what being in a creative loving relationship is all about.     This is where traditionalists and liberals alike may wish to interject. No one is asking him to overthrow rules and regulations for the sake of it. Liberal society is asking him to do it, primarily, for the sake of those still suffering at the sharp end of our culture’s homophobic heritage. The Church might not like being seen as the great curator of that heritage, but at least this shows that some of that society has not laughed and walked away.     Traditionalists are asking why, if he feels women are entitled to be bishops and people who are gay entitled to physical relationships without being excluded, he doesn’t take a stand and openly challenge the Church, instead of sneakily undermining it.     Talk about a poisoned chalice. At least he is in good company as he steps out on to this tightrope, on which the Archbishop of Canterbury is another balanced with his crosier. Canon Annas is steeled to face these challenges while preserving strength to concentrate on the issues most dear to him, such as climate change and the damage of the recession.     On one line he is united with a great many in the Church: All too often newspapers are focussing on these two particular issues, when there are so many issues... A lot of the Church’s agenda is dictated by the media so I encourage you and urge you to start broadening it a bit.     Who can blame him?   END

By David W. Virtue DD   December 2012   Dear VOL friend and loyal supporter,   2013 was another tumultuous year in the life of the Anglican Communion.     In March 2013, an evangelical, Justin Welby was enthroned as the new Archbishop of Canterbury, putting behind eight years of liberally minded Rowan Williams and what many viewed as a disastrous period in the life of the Anglican Communion with unresolved sexuality issues and a failed Covenant.     The year ended with some 1400 Evangelical and Anglo-Catholic Anglican leaders meeting in Nairobi under the banner of GAFCON II to forge a new way ahead for the Anglican Communion that is orthodox in faith and morals. They left no doubt as to where they stood as guardians of the faith. They greeted the Archbishop’s brief presence in Nairobi with polite applause; he offered them nothing that assured them of Canterbury’s commitment to biblical faithfulness in the area of sexual fidelity to marriage between a man and a woman. They were unmoved by his less than sterling support of them and they proceeded to setup the Anglican Mission in England (AMiE).     The polarization within the Anglican Communion only heightened during the year with the Episcopal Church pushing the boundaries on sexuality issues in an attempt to redefine marriage in order to accommodate a handful of men and women who wanted to marry their same-sex partners. Gay†Rites were put forth for experimentation by liberal bishops so clergy could legitimize same-sex unions even though gay marriage is still technically off the table. The Washington National Cathedral announced that they would be the first in line to use experimental Rites. Everyone, of course, knows where this is ultimately going. The Episcopal Church’s decision to endorse marriage equality follows the approval of a Rite for the Blessing of a same-sex relationship at the 2012 General Convention. Lawsuits against four dioceses continued in 2013 and will continue on in 2014. The roughest and toughest calls will be made in South Carolina where the laws favor Bishop Mark Lawrence and TEC has experienced the most pushback. Tens of millions of dollars worth of real estate are at stake. An estimated $22 million has been spent to date on litigation by The Episcopal Church in an effort to retain or take back church properties in these dioceses. When TEC legally wins properties, the bishop of the Diocese of Connecticut, for example, is forced to sell them off to other denominations and to Muslims for conversion into mosques because they cannot financially support them.     The Global South, which is growing and vibrant, is committed to crossing boundaries and rescuing churches in the West under siege by liberal and revisionist bishops.     The Episcopal Church will continue to splinter in 2014 though at a slower pace. TEC will continue to wither and the Anglican Church in North America (ACNA) will continue to grow. The theological divide will only widen in 2014. There will be triumphs and tragedies, winners and losers in the real estate battles. Aging and small TEC congregations will continue to shrink and there will be more diocesan mergers in 2014 (Ex. Quincy to Chicago). There will be ongoing realignment among the Continuers as well. VOL will document it all for you.     But we do need your help to keep the news digests coming weekly into your e-mail and continued daily postings to the website www.virtueonline.org     VOL is 100% reader supported.  So please spare a few dollars for VOL this Christmas season – we are the news source built for you and thousands like you who come each day to get the news about the Anglican Communion. VOL is the leading source for Anglican news across the globe.       Please consider an end of year tax deductible donation and send to the address below:     VIRTUEONLINE P.O. Box 111 Shohola, PA 18458     Or you can make an electronic donation to VOL through our secure site here: www.virtueonline.org/donate.html     END

PRESS RELEASE October 7, 2025   The Church of Nigeria (Anglican Communion) has formally declared its spiritual independence from the Church of England following the appointment of Bishop Sarah Mullally as the new Archbishop of Canterbury.   In a statement issued by the Primate of the Church of Nigeria, the Most Rev’d Henry C. Ndukuba, the Church described the announcement made on Friday, October 3, 2025, as “devastating” and “insensitive.”   According to the statement, the decision represents a “double jeopardy” for the faith: “First, it disregards the conviction of the majority of Anglicans who cannot accept female headship in the episcopate; and second, it is deeply troubling that Bishop Sarah Mullally is a strong supporter of same-sex marriage.”   The Church recalled Bishop Mullally’s 2023 remarks after the Church of England approved blessings for same-sex couples, when she described the move as “a moment of hope.” The Nigerian Church said such views further damage efforts to preserve unity within the Anglican Communion.   “It remains unclear how someone who upholds same-sex marriage can hope to heal the already fractured fabric of the Communion,” the statement added, describing the situation as evidence that global Anglicanism could no longer accept the moral and spiritual leadership of the Church of England.   Reaffirming its alignment with the Global Anglican Future Conference (GAFCON), the Church of Nigeria said it would continue to uphold biblical authority, the historic creeds, evangelism, and holy living—“irrespective of the ongoing revisionist agenda.”   The statement concluded with a call for conservative Anglicans in England and beyond to stand firm in defending scriptural truth.   “We encourage all faithful brothers and sisters in the Church of England who have resisted the aberration called same-sex marriage to continue contending for the faith once delivered to the saints (Jude 1:3),” the Church said.   END

PRESS RELEASE 3rd October 2025   The Anglican Network in Europe (ANiE) notes the appointment of Dame Sarah Mullally as the new Archbishop of Canterbury. ANiE exists as an Anglican jurisdiction separate from the Canterbury structures, and we look to the global leadership of Gafcon for spiritual vision and oversight.   Gafcon has made a clear statement about the appointment which can be found on their website. The statement explains why the large majority of the Anglican Communion will not be able to work with Dame Sarah in her new role because of her support for “unbiblical and revisionist teachings regarding marriage and sexual morality”, and more broadly, the office of the Archbishop of Canterbury’s track record of departure from key aspects of historic Christian doctrine and ethics.   The appointment demonstrates the imposition of the worldview of elites from the Western world rather than a desire to engage with and unite faithful Anglicans from different cultures for the sake of gospel mission.   Anglican churches, Dioceses and Provinces around the world which are growing and thriving are those which adhere to traditional Christian teaching. There are many such congregations which remain in the Church of England. Our prayers and support are with them as they decide what to do in the face of this appointment. As a response to the increasing alignment of church leaders and structures in the West with secularised theologies and policies, Gafcon has set up new Anglican jurisdictions outside Canterbury structures. One of these is ANiE, whose congregations provide an alternative, safe home for bible-based Anglicans, and an opportunity to start new churches where people are.   END

The Rev. Dr. Ronald Moore Oct 7, 2025   When the Church of England recently enthroned a woman as Archbishop of Canterbury, the media heralded it as a triumph of progress and equality. The ecclesiastical establishment congratulated itself for “reflecting the times.” Yet beneath the fanfare lies a grim theological reality: in crossing this line, Anglicanism has not merely altered its customs or broadened its leadership — it has ruptured the very fabric of apostolic continuity.   This is not hyperbole. The issue is not about preference, tradition, or even ecclesiastical polity. It is about sacramental reality — the sinew and lifeblood of the Church’s continuity with Christ and His Apostles. To ordain a woman as bishop is not simply to make a controversial appointment; it is to sever the line of apostolic succession itself, leaving the Church structurally maimed and sacramentally hollow.   I. Apostolic Succession: More Than a Lineage Apostolic succession is one of the most misunderstood doctrines in the Christian faith. In the popular imagination it is often reduced to a kind of institutional pedigree — a chain of hands laid upon heads stretching back to Peter and Paul. While this visible continuity is indeed part of it, the deeper reality is far more profound.   Apostolic succession is not merely about who ordained whom; it is about what is being transmitted. The episcopate is not a managerial office but a sacramental one. Through the laying on of hands by a validly consecrated bishop, the grace and authority entrusted by Christ to the Apostles is perpetuated in the Church. It is this succession that preserves the Church’s sacramental life, ensures the valid celebration of the Eucharist, and safeguards the deposit of faith.   St. Irenaeus, writing in the second century, put it plainly: “It is within the power of all, therefore, in every Church, who may wish to see the truth, to contemplate clearly the tradition of the Apostles manifested throughout the whole world; and we are in a position to reckon up those who were by the Apostles instituted bishops in the Churches, and to demonstrate the succession of these men to our own times” (Against Heresies III.3.1). The continuity of that line is not ceremonial — it is constitutive of the Church’s very being.   II. In Persona Christi: The Christological Foundation of Holy Orders The episcopate, and indeed the priesthood, is not a functional role that anyone may assume. It is a sacramental participation in the headship of Christ. A bishop does not simply represent the Church to the world; he represents Christ to the Church. The language of the Fathers is consistent and unwavering: the bishop is typos Christou — an icon or living image of Christ the High Priest.   This is why the Church has always insisted on the maleness of the ordained minister. Christ was not incarnate as generic humanity but as a man — not because masculinity is superior, but because in the divine economy of salvation, His male humanity is integral to His identity as the Bridegroom who lays down His life for the Bride. The nuptial mystery between Christ and His Church is inscribed in the very structure of the sacrament of Holy Orders.   St. John Chrysostom observed: “The priest stands bringing down, not fire from heaven, but the Holy Spirit. He touches the Lord of all things, and with his tongue he draws down grace from heaven” (On the Priesthood III.4). This work is not symbolic but sacramental — a participation in Christ’s own priesthood. If the sacrament is to be valid, the sign must conform to the reality it conveys. Matter and form must align. And here the Church has always understood that the matter of Holy Orders is a baptized male, precisely because the sacrament signifies Christ the Bridegroom acting for and toward His Bride.   III. Invalid Matter, Broken Sacrament All sacraments require three things: proper form, proper matter, and proper intent. If any of these is absent, the sacrament does not merely become illicit or irregular — it becomes invalid. This is not an opinion but a settled principle of sacramental theology taught by East and West alike since the earliest centuries.   For Holy Orders, the form is the prayer of consecration, the intent is to ordain a minister of Christ’s Church, and the matter is a baptized male. Remove any of these and there is no sacrament. Thus, when a woman is presented for ordination, the Church does not “ordain a female priest” — it simply performs a ritual that has no sacramental effect. The outward ceremony may look the same, but no priesthood is conferred because the essential conditions are not met.   The implications are catastrophic. A woman “bishop” cannot validly ordain priests or consecrate bishops, because she herself does not possess the sacramental character of episcopacy. Those she “ordains” are not priests; those they “ordain” are not bishops. The chain of apostolic succession is not merely bent — it is broken. The visible structure may remain, but it becomes an empty shell, like a lamp disconnected from its source of light.   IV. The Patristic and Conciliar Consensus The universal Church has never wavered on this point. Every ecumenical council, from Nicaea to Chalcedon and beyond, assumed without question the maleness of the episcopate and priesthood. Canon 19 of Nicaea (325) explicitly excludes women who acted as “deaconesses” from any participation in the sacramental ministry, clarifying that they “are to be counted among the laity.”   The Fathers, too, are unanimous. Tertullian scorned the notion of women assuming clerical functions: “It is not permitted for a woman to speak in the Church, nor to teach, nor to baptize, nor to offer, nor to claim for herself any masculine function” (On the Veiling of Virgins 9). St. Epiphanius, writing against heresies, declared: “Never was a woman a priest among Christians” (Panarion 79.3). This unbroken consensus is not a matter of cultural conditioning but of fidelity to the apostolic deposit.   V. Apostolic Succession and Ecclesial Identity The Church is not merely a voluntary society of believers. She is the mystical Body of Christ, animated by the Holy Spirit and structured by divine ordinance. Apostolic succession is not an optional adornment to that structure; it is its backbone. It is what binds the visible Church to the apostolic Church, ensuring that the faith once delivered to the saints is handed on not only in word but in sacrament and authority.   Without valid succession, the Church’s sacramental life collapses. The Eucharist, celebrated by one not truly ordained, is not the Eucharist. Absolution given by one without priestly authority is not absolution. Confirmation conferred by one who is not a bishop is not confirmation. What remains is not the Church Catholic but a simulacrum — a body with the form of religion but none of its sacramental substance.   This is precisely why Rome declared Anglican orders “absolutely null and utterly void” in Apostolicae Curae (1896) — not out of spite, but because defects in form and intent had rendered the succession doubtful. With the introduction of women’s ordination, that doubt becomes certainty. It is no longer possible to speak of a valid sacramental ministry in a church that ordains women as bishops. Apostolic succession there has not merely been questioned — it has ceased.   VI. A Church Divided Against Herself Some attempt to sidestep this conclusion by claiming that apostolic succession is a matter of the Church’s recognition rather than sacramental fact — that if the Church declares a woman bishop, she is one. But this is ecclesial positivism masquerading as theology. The Church is the steward, not the master, of the sacraments. She cannot make what God has not given. As St. Augustine said of the Church’s authority: “She is the mother, not the mistress, of the sacraments.”   Moreover, such reasoning reduces apostolic succession to a human construct and the episcopate to a political office. It turns the Church into a democracy rather than a divine society. And as history shows, once sacramental reality is subordinated to the spirit of the age, the Church ceases to be the pillar and ground of the truth (1 Timothy 3:15) and becomes instead a mirror reflecting the culture around her.   The result is internal contradiction. A body that claims communion with the apostolic Church while abandoning the conditions of apostolic succession is like a tree severed from its roots. It may appear alive for a time, but it is already dying. And unless grafted back into the living trunk, it will wither.   VII. The Cost of Fidelity — and the Call to Return None of this is easy to say. It would be more comfortable to treat the ordination of women as a secondary matter — a difference of opinion among Christians of good will. But to do so would be dishonest. The stakes are nothing less than the Church’s sacramental identity and continuity with the apostolic faith.   The solution is not arrogance or triumphalism but repentance. The path back is not through innovation but through obedience. The Church cannot heal herself by doubling down on disobedience; she must return to the order God has established. Only then will the broken line of succession be mended and the full sacramental life of the Church restored.   The temptation to conform to the world is ancient. It is the same temptation that led Israel to demand a king “like all the nations” (1 Samuel 8:5), and the same impulse that prompted the Galatians to turn back to “the weak and beggarly elements” (Galatians 4:9). Yet the Church does not exist to reflect the world’s values; she exists to bear witness to the truth that judges the world. And that truth is not ours to redefine.   Faithfulness, Not Fashion The enthronement of a female Archbishop of Canterbury is being hailed as a sign of progress, but it is in fact a sign of rupture. It is the outward expression of an inward schism — a church that has chosen the applause of the age over fidelity to the apostolic deposit. In so doing, it has broken the line that binds it to the Apostles, and with that break comes the collapse of sacramental assurance.   The Church does not belong to us. Her sacraments, her ministry, her order are not human inventions to be reshaped according to the mood of the times. They are divine gifts entrusted to us in fragile vessels. Our task is not to innovate but to guard, not to adapt but to hand on.   The line that stretches from the Upper Room through Antioch, Rome, Alexandria, and Canterbury is not a chain of human tradition — it is the living artery of grace. To cut it is not to evolve; it is to die. And if the Church would live again, she must return — humbly, faithfully, obediently — to the order her Lord Himself ordained.   END

By the Rev. Dr. Ronald Moore October 7, 2025   The Church in the West is dying not because God has grown weak, nor because the gospel has lost its power, but because we have turned the living, acting God into a tame abstraction — and our faith into a spectator sport. We speak of Him as if He were an idea to be admired, a concept to be discussed, a memory to be venerated. But He is none of those things. Our God is a verb. He  creates . He  commands . He  calls . He  judges . He  redeems . He  restores . He  returns . Every page of Scripture is an action, and every revelation is movement. And yet we, His people — those who claim to follow the living Christ — have reduced our response to sitting quietly in a pew once a week, consuming spiritual content, and calling it “faith.” We were never meant to be spectators. And the world is burning while the Church watches from the bleachers. The Curse of Convenience In the early Church, there was one Body, one faith, one baptism. If you walked away from the Church, you walked away from the faith. Today, we have a buffet. If First Baptist offends you, try Tate Baptist. If the Baptists in general are too much, there’s a Presbyterian church down the street. And if they preach anything uncomfortable, there’s always a non-denominational place with better coffee and a rock band. We have turned the Bride of Christ into a marketplace — and the customer is always right. The result is predictable: no accountability, no discipline, no commitment. A Christianity that costs nothing, demands nothing, and therefore  means  nothing. The first believers risked their lives to gather. We’ll change churches because the sermon went five minutes too long. If faith is a noun — a label we wear, a box we check — then of course we drift to wherever it feels easiest. But if faith is a verb — a costly, daily act of obedience — then we will stay, endure, and grow even when it hurts. Especially when it hurts. The Entertainment Gospel Too many pulpits have traded the Word of God for a weekly dose of soothing affirmation. We no longer preach repentance because it might offend. We no longer call sin by its name because it might empty the pews. We avoid the Cross because it might interrupt someone’s brunch plans. But the apostles did not die to deliver motivational speeches. They did not endure imprisonment and martyrdom to proclaim a gospel of self-esteem. They thundered the truth of a holy God before kings and mobs alike — and they did so knowing it might cost them everything. Christ did not say, “Come and be comfortable.” He said,  “If anyone desires to come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me.”  (Luke 9:23, NKJV) The verbs are the point:  deny .  Take up .  Follow . A Christianity without verbs is no Christianity at all — it is a hollow shell dressed in religious language. The Cost of Action The Church we dream of — the one that cares for its members, shapes its neighborhoods, raises up saints and missionaries — will never exist while Christians treat faith as a hobby. It will only come when we accept that discipleship is work. It means showing up when it’s inconvenient.It means serving people who may never thank you.It means sacrificing money, time, and comfort.It means speaking truth when silence would be easier. And yes — it means staying in a congregation even when someone wounds your pride, because the Church is not a club designed to please you. It is a crucible designed to sanctify you. If our faith is alive, it will  act . If it acts, it will  cost . And if it costs, it will  change us . Clergy: The Fire Must Begin in the Pulpit If the sheep are weak, it is because the shepherds have grown timid. If the people are passive, it is because the preachers have been polite. We do not need clever talks. We need prophets again — men and women who will stand in pulpits and declare, “Thus says the Lord,” no matter the consequences. The Church needs sermons that wound our pride so that grace can heal our souls. We need pastors willing to lose members, donors, and even positions rather than compromise the truth. The Church does not need to be popular. It needs to be  holy . And holiness does not come from comfort — it comes from the consuming fire of God. A Verb-Faith Changes the World The world is not hungry for another church service. It is starving for a people who live as if God is real — as if the gospel is true — as if eternity is near. When Christians act, things change: orphans are adopted, widows are cared for, schools are built, prisons are visited, slaves are freed, and nations are transformed. When Christians sit passively, the opposite happens: families crumble, injustice thrives, and evil advances unopposed. We do not overcome darkness by analyzing it. We overcome it by  lighting lamps . We do not silence lies by lamenting them. We silence them by  proclaiming truth . If the Church rediscovered this — if we stopped making faith a noun and started living it as a verb — the decline of Western Christianity would end almost overnight. We would see conversions not because we marketed Jesus better, but because we  embodied  Him more faithfully. A Final Word of Thunder The lukewarm church nauseates the Lord (Revelation 3:16). That is not my opinion; it is His Word. If that rebuke stings, it is meant to. We have been complacent long enough. We have mistaken safety for faithfulness, numbers for fruit, and busyness for mission. Our God  acts  — and if we are His people, so must we. So, Church, stop trying to make Christianity comfortable. Stop searching for sermons that never cut, and churches that never challenge. Stop consuming faith as if it were entertainment. Take up your cross. Deny yourself. Follow Him. Do not  call  yourself a Christian.  Be  one. Our God is a verb. Our faith must be as well.