BBC News July 2, 2004 The openly gay canon who felt compelled to withdraw his candidature as Bishop of Reading is to be installed as Dean of St Albans on Friday. Dr Jeffrey John has been approved by the Queen for the job - one of the most senior roles in the Church of England. He was persuaded to stand down from the Reading candidature after protests from conservative evangelicals in July 2003. Conservative Anglicans have also criticised the appointment of Dr John, who says he is celibate, as dean. But Martin Reynolds, of the Lesbian and Gay Christian Movement, urged parishioners to give him a chance. Caring Pastor Mr Reynolds told BBC News that Dr John has a "fantastic, pastoral heart" and said he was "horrified" by objections to the appointment. "To the people of St Alban's I say you've got a fantastic parish priest, a fantastic dean - give him a chance," he said. And the Bishop of St Albans, the Rt Rev Christopher Herbert, also welcomed Dr John's appointment. In April, when the appointment was announced, the bishop said: "Jeffrey John has a well deserved reputation for being a good, caring pastor. He is an intelligent, courageous priest who will follow a long line of superb Deans of St Albans and will bring to the Abbey a wide range of gifts. He is a man of prayer, a preacher and teacher of real authority and grace." Objections But conservative Anglicans have objected to his appointment. In June, St Peter and St Paul's Church in Cranfield withheld funds from the diocese in protest. And in April evangelical commentator David Virtue described it as an "outrageous appointment." Mr Virtue, who runs the website Virtuosity, added: "It is a backdoor attempt to make homosexuality mainstream in the Church of England." Dr John was previously Canon Chancellor and Bishop's Adviser for Ministry in the Diocese of Southwark since 1997. He now becomes Rector of the Cathedral and Abbey Church of St Albans as well as dean. BBC News Online: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news

OPINION   by Bijan Omrani   THE TELEGRAPH February 19, 2026   As it is, the Church simply isn’t doing enough - James Manning/PA Wire   This past year, there has been a lessening of the multi-generational gloom that has hung over British churches since the 1960s. The conviction that Christianity would soon be swept away by secular modernity has been recently overturned by the “Quiet Revival”: the idea that many, particularly the young, are beginning to find faith and even return to the pews.   However, these claims, which were based on surveys by the Bible Society published last April, have now been thrown into doubt. Humanists UK, following the lead of Matthew’s Gospel, has started to warn of false prophets who “shall shew great signs and wonders.” In their view, the Bible Society is one of this number.   The Humanists’ analysis of other new data, including the 2024 Social Attitudes Survey and even some of the Church of England’s own statistics, shows, so they argue, that there is no Quiet Revival in churchgoing, but rather “ongoing decline”.   The truth remains unclear. Sources connected with the Bible Society survey argue that the Humanists’ critique is flawed. Many clergy, dealing with crowds of Gen Z converts, observe that it does not pass the sniff test. The Humanists, however, claim the support of psephological grandees such as Prof Sir John Curtice.   And all this is before one acknowledges that how one measures religious affiliation – is it regular church going, church membership, self-identification? – has been the subject of acrimonious disagreement since the 19th century.   Whatever the truth, British Christians, and especially the Church of England, would be wise not to despite the Humanists’ chastening. What if, like Jeremiah, they are correctly prophesying a collapse from which we are foolishly turning our eyes? If there is even a possibility that the Quiet Revival is merely a statistical mirage, and that “destruction upon destruction” is really what awaits the parishes and congregations, is the Church of England treating this desperate situation with the urgency and seriousness that it deserves?   The Church’s General Synod was meeting last week in Westminster. If its business is to be taken as an indication of the Church’s thinking, the answer has to be that it is refusing to confront what might well be an existential crisis. This is not to say that the Synod is not dealing with worthy and necessary matters. It has debated poverty and social care. It has been grappling with safeguarding and the mental health of clergy. But whilst it seems happy to be contending with issues of process, and to devote endless air-time to questions of same-sex marriage and minor issues from special interest groups – for example, a crusade for sustainable flower arranging – there is hardly any intellectual energy or attention devoted to debating the fundamental questions of why it seems so difficult to engage the nation with the Christian message, and what the Church should do in response.   If the Church were serious about dealing with the decline in numbers, it would be straining every sinew to reacquaint the nation with the fundamentals of the Christian story and scripture. It would be attempting to re-propagate an inherited culture of hymns and music, choirs, liturgy, poetry and literature which brought the faith to life, and into people’s lives. It would be working boldly to call for the Bible and Christian culture to be a more prominent part of school education and public life, and to remind people of the central importance of this culture.   In the absence of this, people will simply not have the knowledge of Christianity that will allow them to come to faith, even if they have the urge to do it. When Christ and the disciples preached in Galilee and Jerusalem, they were preaching to a people who, although poor, knew scripture and the idea that a Messiah had been promised.   As it is, the Church simply isn’t doing enough. It is underpowered in spreading public knowledge of the faith. Instead of proper investment in its workhorses – the parish clergy – it funds ever ballooning diocesan bureaucracies and wastes its capital with unjustifiable initiatives such as Project Spire, the £100m “reparations” payment for historic slavery.   This is not the behaviour of a church that is taking its problems seriously. Just as Jerusalem should have listened to Jeremiah before the Babylonians destroyed it, so too should the church now pay heed to the warnings of the Humanists, before it is too late.   Bijan Omrani is the author of God is an Englishman: Christianity and the Creation of England

By Chuck Collins www.virtueonline.org February 18, 2026   Martin Luther died in his home town of Eisleben, Germany on February 18, 1546 at the age of sixty-two. It’s impossible to overstate the impact he had on the Christian church, including the Church of England.   His theology of the cross (theologia crucis) drove all the aspects of his life and thinking. Luther wrote that there are two stories: the glory story and the cross story. The glory road is our default setting as human beings which involves climbing the morality ladder to gain the necessary merit to eventually arrive at glory. Chin-up and determination (working the spiritual disciplines and trying harder) will get us to where we need to be, as our god-coach yells instructions from the sidelines.   The theology of the cross, on the other hand, begins with “no one is righteous, not even one.” And, because we are dead in our trespasses and sins, we don’t need a coach, we need a Savior with power and authority to bring dead people to life. Theologians of the cross know that faithfulness follows faith in a perfectly faithful God. Jesus is true to his promises: I came to seek and to save the lost.   Luther succinctly reminds us: The law say “do this,” and it is never done. Grace says “believe this,” and it is already done. (Heidelberg Disputation, Thesis 26)   The English Reformation began as a purely Lutheran reformation (“sister reformations”), sharing the same passions to bring the church back under the authority of Holy Scripture. Germany was slightly more concerned with doctrinal matters, while England more with political concerns (including the divine right of kings), but Luther profoundly influenced every early English reformer in the 1520s and 1530s. After the English Lutheran reformer Robert Barnes died in 1540, closer ties began developing between the English church and the Swiss Reformers. This didn’t mean, however, that Lutheranism died a strange death in England as Alec Ryrie mistakenly claims, but rather, “the spirit of Luther’s religion and theology began to settle on Elizabethan England like a London fog…it just seeped into the atmosphere” (William Clebsch).   Although there was gradually a Calvinist consensus in the Church of England especially around how “justification by faith” relates to the sacraments, this only added to our Lutheran grounding. Lutheranism continued to influence the English church, one example being that about half of the Thirty-nine Articles of Religion (Anglican’s confessional statement) are heavily indebted to the Augsburg Confession and other Lutheran documents.   The Church of England owes very much to Martin Luther. His teaching is evident throughout the Anglican formularies: the Bible is the only God-inspired authority, the central doctrine of Scripture is justification by grace through faith alone and this is the governing rubric for corporate worship, the unfree human will (The Bondage of the Will, thought by Luther to be his most important writing), and our understanding of the distinction between law and gospel (the topic of Luther’s The Heidelberg Disputation, 1518).   The 16th century Reformation and the Edwardian and Elizabethan Settlements established the Church of England once and for all to be thoroughly biblical, theologically reformed and confessional, pastorally generous, and liturgically beautiful. And behind this were the writings and teachings of the German monk and priest, Martin Luther.   Dean Chuck Collins is a reform theologian who regularly writes on Anglican issues. He resides in Texas.

The Unhappy & Abusive Marriage of Liberalism & Modernism by James Hitchcock TOUCHSTONE MAGAZINE American politics is now as acrimonious as it has perhaps ever been. This may be puzzling to some as there are seemingly no longer any deep divisions within the polity. Most Americans, after all, are internationalists and free marketers of some kind, who disagree only within those parameters. But there are deep and growing divisions. What is being played out now, acrimoniously, are the final implications of the agenda of the modernist movement, and of the liberalism it transformed in the 1960s, the final working out of ideas that were present from the beginning in the late 1700s but for a long time remained only half-recognized. This movement has made every political disagreement a dispute over fundamental beliefs, and indeed over the nature of reality: matters over which people will fight with particular ferocity. Modernism in this sense is not the historical reality of modernization. It is an almost religious commitment to radical change, a fevered sense of the past as oppressive, a determination to move ruthlessly into the future no matter what the cost, an urge to shock traditional sensibilities. (Like all movements, I should note, modernism can be defined in a variety of ways, and not all self-conscious modernists espouse its entire agenda.) It is inherently nihilistic, at its core nothing less than the systematic negation of every established belief and institution, the denial that any ultimate truth underlies culture, the often demonic conviction that destruction is the necessary preliminary to creation. It has touched deep and sinister springs in the human psyche: the love of negation and annihilation for their own sakes. Gratuitous, anarchical terrorism is in a sense modernism's ultimate expression. [Content continues with extensive analysis of modernism, liberalism, and their convergence...] James Hitchcock is a senior editor of Touchstone. http://www.touchstonemag.com/docs/issues/17.4docs/17-04-021.html END

By Melanie Phillips June 30, 2004 The letter to the Prime Minister from the Archbishops of Canterbury and York, backed by every diocesan, suffragan and assistant bishop in the Church of England, demonstrates once again the deep moral confusion and prejudice that has engulfed the church. It is not just that these church leaders are against the Iraq war. It is not just that they talk about the reprehensible abuse of Iraqi prisoners by coalition forces as if this was a policy that expressed the innate values of the west rather than an abuse which has caused widespread shock and disgust and been apologised for and stopped. It is what they say about Israel which is so revealing, so disgusting and so intensely distressing. For on this issue, they spectacularly depart from the principles of even-handedness which they commend (their suggestion that Britain was ever an 'honest broker' in the Middle East is itself a gross distortion of history, given that it was Britain which betrayed its promises to the Jews under the Palestine Mandate, did its best to thwart the creation of the Jewish national home which it had solemnly undertaken to bring about and then turned a blind eye to mass Arab illegal immigration to Palestine while denying access to Jews fleeing the Holocaust; but let that pass). They expressly come at this solely from the perspective of Arab and Muslim opinion. There is no mention of the rights of Israel or the Jews as the principal victims of annihilatory aggression and prejudice. Instead, there is this: 'Within the wider Christian community we also have theological work to do to counter those interpretations of the Scriptures from outside the mainstream of the tradition which appear to have become increasingly influential in fostering an uncritical and one-sided approach to the future of the Holy Land'. This is an astonishingly revealing and disturbing paragraph. For in their coded attack on Christian Zionists —the one group which tells the truth about the Middle East and recognises that Israel is the historic and present victim of annihilatory terror, not its perpetrator —these Archbishops have sided with those in the church who promote instead an agenda of malevolent lies towards Israel and the Jews. Anyone who reads the venomously distorted, ahistorical diatribes about the Middle East put out by Christian Aid and other Christian charities or those Palestinian thinkers like Naim Ateek who are so lionised by the church hierarchy, or reads the remarks made about 'Nazi' or 'apartheid' Israel, and the resurgent claim within the church that the Jews are 'excluded' from God's love and therefore their claim to the Promised Land, can see there is indeed an 'uncritical and one-sided approach to the future of the Holy Land' inside the church — but it belongs to the opposite camp, one that the Archbishops have now implicitly endorsed. So what lies behind this? According to the Times, the Archbishops are worried by anti-Muslim feeling: 'One of their main concerns is the damage caused by the conflict to community relations in Britain between Muslims and non-Muslims. Some of the strongest advocates for the letter were bishops from cities with large Muslim populations, such as Bradford. They are concerned by a rise in Islamophobia and fear that the September 11 attacks have desensitised emotions so that the treatment meted out to detainees no longer causes the moral outrage it should.' But what about the rampant Judeophobia now on almost daily display in the malevolent and mendacious campaign to delegitimise Israel, and the corresponding resurgence of libels and prejudice against the Jews? On this, the Archbishops are totally silent. The Times also tells us that: 'On Israel, the archbishops were expressing concerns among the bishops that the new steps towards a settlement should not be on Israel's terms only'. But the only reason a prospective settlement is currently being proposed on terms laid down by Israel is that the Palestinians have not stopped waging genocidal war against it. If they stopped doing so and showed they were really prepared to live in peace with a Jewish state, negotiations would re-open tomorrow. But they refuse to do so. The Archbishops are effectively saying that the perpetrators of this war against Israel should be given an equal right to lay down terms for a settlement. What astonishing moral bankruptcy from religious leaders. The Church of England is now squarely supporting the enemies of the west. It is high time other Christians rose up to denounce it and reclaim their religion for truth and moral decency. END

CBC Ottawa June 30, 2004 Ottawa's Anglican bishop says a convicted sex offender may continue his choir conducting duties at St. John's Anglican Church. John Gallienne plays organ and conducts the adult choir there. Last month, the bishop of the Anglican Diocese of Ottawa came under pressure after a newspaper article revealed Gallienne had been convicted in 1990 of sex crimes against young boys. After reflection, Bishop Peter Coffin now says Gallienne can continue with his choir duties, but under certain conditions: Gallienne is never to be involved with children or youth, and he can't work in any other church but St. John's. George Bruce, Bishop of the Ontario Diocese, raised his concerns about the matter in May. He's based in Kingston near the cathedral where the offences took place. "Our concern from both the diocese and the cathedral was the potential for re-offending and it seems they've addressed that," said Bruce. St. John's is the only church in Ottawa to offer a program for sex offenders. Called Circles of Support, it helps ex-inmates get back on their feet. "We're very pleased that the situation at St. John's has been clarified," said Pat Love, an advisor with the support program. "It's just been so very public that it's been a very painful thing for everybody." Love says many parishioners have rallied around Gallienne and his wife in past weeks to let them know that, in spite of what happened years ago, they're still welcome in the church. END

By Bill Harless From Nashville (TN) City Paper July 1, 2004 Last November, the Episcopal Church U.S.A. approved the consecration of Gene Robinson as Bishop of New Hampshire, the first openly homosexual bishop in the Church. That decision has now had repercussions in Nashville. St. Bartholomew's Episcopal Church on Belmont Park Terrace is splitting, some members leaving to found a new non-Episcopalian church. The split is amicable. St. Bartholomew's unanimously opposes Robinson's consecration and the recognition of same-sex blessings in the Church. But some members, according to Senior Warden Scott Kammerer, want to "stay and fight for orthodoxy within the Episcopal Church," while others "cannot tolerate what they see as apostasy" and feel they must leave. "They can no longer with good conscience remain affiliated with the Episcopal Church," said Kammerer. Kammerer will stay at Saint Bartholomew's: "We want to wait and see what happens" within the Episcopal Church. Now is "not yet the time for us to leave." "Even though this is a division, there really are no hard feelings...We all have tremendous love for one another." The new church, The Church of the Redeemer, will still remain within the World Wide Anglican Communion. The Anglican Communion consists of Anglican churches in Europe, Asia, Africa and the Americas. The new church will begin holding formal worship services Sunday evenings on August 8 at Otter Creek Church of Christ. Thomas McKenzie will be its priest – Wednesday was his last day as interim rector of Saint Bartholomew's. "It's been emotionally difficult because we do love each other so much," he said. "Saint Bartholomew's and the Church of the Redeemer have nothing but love and respect for one another." Saint Bartholomew's will not share any money with the Church of the Redeemer to help establish it. "An Episcopal church cannot plant or start a non-Episcopal church," McKenzie said. "If we were to take anything from St. Bartholomew's, that would be inappropriate." "We have not asked anyone for money yet, but we will be receiving tithes, donations, offerings – and can now – though we haven't asked for any money yet. People who are starting the church have already pledged funds." McKenzie believes the Episcopal Church has "distorted" the Bible and that contemporary Christians are facing a "new Reformation." "Part of the reason for the decay of the Episcopal Church is the same reason that the Roman Catholic Church [decayed] in the time of Martin Luther," he said. "For instance, the church decided that salvation was for sale, so they sold it. And in our time, the Episcopal Church has decided that human sexuality is expressed however you want to express it rather than how God expresses it." McKenzie believes Christian denominationalism is a "dying entity" and that new "networks of churches" are forming, "related to each other through bonds of the spirit and bonds of affinity rather than relations of power, prestige, and wealth, which is how the mainline [establishment] has related to its churches." And Otter Creek's temporary sharing of its building is "a blessed example of that." "The people of Otter Creek have been incredibly gracious and welcoming to us and have shown us nothing but love...", he said. END

Ethics & Religion Supreme Court Favors Obscenity, Not Kids by Michael J. McManus By the narrowest 5-4 margin the Supreme Court has once again permitted the free flow of obscenity on the Internet to children rather than to protect them. "The high court keeps doing this, even though the sexual images in the media are destroying the innocence of our children and ruining our society," lamented Ted Baehr, Director of The Christian Film & Television Commission. "We must change the media, change lawmakers and change our judicial system. The lives of our children and grandchildren are at stake, as are the moral virtue and spiritual sanctity of America." Morality in Media (MIM) gives evidence of countless children assaulted by sexual images: A stunning 84 percent of boys and 60 percent of girls aged 16-17 "stumbled" on Internet sex sites by accident and 38 percent of boys deliberately search the Internet for porn. Most girls, 13-18, say they can get around parents' rules, and 42 percent can get to a site of adults having sex. "I was naive about the Internet," sighed a mother to MIM's President Robert Peters. "I thought you had to pay for pornography." As recently as 2000, the Supreme Court declared that businesses that engage "in the sordid business of pandering" by "deliberately emphasizing the sexually provocative...in order to catch the salaciously disposed...engage in constitutionally unprotected behavior." To put it more bluntly, obscenity is not protected by the First Amendment. Four years later the Supreme Court suffers from amnesia, unable to recall its own rulings. In rejecting the Child Online Protection Act (COPA), that imposed criminal penalties of as much as $50,000 a day on commercial Internet sites that make pornography available to kids younger than 17, the court said the government must show why the voluntary use of filters to screen out material unsuitable for minors would not work as well as criminal sanctions. Nonsense, said Justice Antonin Scalia, in a terse two paragraph dissent. "Since this business could, consistent with the First Amendment, be banned entirely, COPA's lesser restrictions raise no constitutional concern." Sadly, Scalia was in the minority of the 5-4 decision. In 1996 Congress passed and President Clinton signed a law, the Communications Decency Act to protect children from obscenity. It was unanimously declared unconstitutional by the Court. So Congress went back to the drawing board and fashioned a more carefully drawn law that allowed adults full access to illegal obscenity that depicts sexual acts, but would restrict minors' access to it by requiring use of a credit card or adult personal ID. The law passed with only one Senator (Patrick Leahy) voting against it and a handful of Congressmen. On Tuesday the Court said it liked filters on computers that "impose selective restrictions on speech at the receiving end, not universal restrictions at the source," as Justice Anthony Kennedy wrote in the majority opinion. The only glimmer of hope is that if the government can prove that filters do not work in a re-trial of the case, the Supreme Court said it would reconsider its decision. Almost exasperatedly, Justice Stephen Breyer's dissent noted some flaws with filters that parents can place on computers to limit porn to their children: The software "cannot distinguish between the most obscene pictorial image and the Venus de Milo." It depends on parents willing to limit their children's access to the Web "and able to enforce it." That's not reasonable since 28 million school age children "have both parents or their sole parent in the work force." Many of these children "will spend afternoons and evenings with friends who may well have access to computers and more lenient parents." The Supreme Court rejected the COPA law partly because it would not block foreign obscenity sites, accounting for 40 percent of the sludge. However, Breyer argued that limiting the other 60 percent is still significant. Why is the Supreme Court more interested in protecting illegal obscenity than it is in protecting the health of children? By the vote of a single justice, millions of children will be corrupted. Parents have two recourses: filter your computers with a free system offered by AOL or your provider. More important, buy a system that can track every site your computer has logged onto called Covenant Eyes (877 479-1119). Wives: are you concerned about your husband's addiction? Men: do you need an accountability partner? Covenant Eyes would work for you too, at a cost of $6.95 a month. END TXT. Copyright 2004 Michael J. McManus

July 1, 2004 The installation of Dr Jeffrey John as Dean of St Albans marks a significant and regrettable step for the Church of England. It demonstrates that there are many who will not abide by the teaching of Scripture and will not stop until they have changed the teaching of the Church on sexual ethics. All the evidence is that the liberalisation of the Church is destroying it. A liberal church, having abandoned the standards and message given by God in Scripture, has nothing to say to the world and no power to transform lives. Decline has been and will be the inevitable result. Church Society and others have consistently argued that it is unacceptable for someone who teaches the acceptability of same sex sexual practice to be a minister in the Church of England. The teaching of Holy Scripture is plain on this issue that sexual intercourse belongs solely within heterosexual marriage. This teaching has been consistently upheld by the Christian Church throughout history, it was reiterated by the General Synod in 1987 and by the Lambeth Bishops in 1998. The failure of many leaders to uphold this position today is undermining the credibility and mission of the Church of England. This appointment flies in the face of the teaching of the Church. The teaching of the Church of England is that homosexual practice falls short of God's standards and should be met with a call to repentance (General Synod resolution of 1987). To appoint to a prominent position someone who, whilst claiming to be celibate, is apparently unrepentant for past behaviour and actually teaches the acceptability of such behaviour, destroys the Christian teaching on repentance. The Bishop of St. Albans and the Archbishop of Canterbury by agreeing to this appointment are themselves contravening the specific decisions of the Church in their desire to pursue their own agenda. Church Society exists to uphold biblical teaching and to promote and defend the character of the Church of England as a reformed and national Church. END

Church of England Newspaper A right of appeal to the Archbishop of Canterbury may be needed to resolve disputes in the Anglican Communion, argue a group of Roman Catholic and Anglican leaders in a submission to the Lambeth Commission led by Archbishop Robin Eames. The submission by a sub-commission of the Inter Anglican and Roman Catholic Commission on Unity and Mission, claims that the crisis represented by the consecration of a practising homosexual bishop in the United States could seriously damage relationships between the two Churches. They argue that the current situation suggests the need to strengthen the role of Archbishop of Canterbury and the 'focal role of the Primates within provinces.' "These would be important developments during this interim period as we continue to work towards full visible unity between the Anglican Communion and the Catholic Church." The sub-commission said that despite disagreements Anglicans and Roman Catholics derived from scripture and tradition the same controlling vision of the nature of humanity and shared the same fundamental moral values. The New Hampshire consecration, they said, had prompted them to question whether the Churches of the Anglican Communion can sustain the same teaching in practice. In the talk of impaired and broken communion that had arisen from the crisis, they questioned whether the damage of the consecration could be "acceptable to those who profess belief in one holy, catholic and apostolic church." Furthermore, they contend that the consecration has weakened "constitutive elements of communion – the unity of the episcopate, the authority of scripture and its interplay with tradition and the holding of 'the same basic moral values'." They ask: "How can a bishop whose ordination made him a cause of controversy… represent the local community in the councils of the Church? How can he mediate the unity of the universal Church to his diocese when he is at odds with large segments of the universal church, the latter arguing that he has departed from the moral teaching of the apostolic faith?" The hard-hitting submission suggests that the crisis damages the communion of the diocese of New Hampshire with all the Churches in the Anglican Communion. A statement from last week's meeting of the Lambeth Commission simply called its talks 'constructive'. The leadership of the Episcopal Church in the USA and the leadership of the Anglican Communion network both made submissions to the Commission. But the most hard-hitting one of all by Archbishop Drexel Gomez forcefully argued that the New Hampshire consecration was invalid. In comments reported in a new book on the homosexuality debate in the Anglican Communion by Guardian reporter Stephen Bates, the Archbishop of Canterbury suggested that once the dust had settled outside mediation might be necessary to reconcile the Anglican Communion. END

By David W. Virtue BEDFORD, TX- (6/28/2004) It is impossible to overrate the ill health of The Episcopal Church. The difficulty nowadays is to make a caricature of the institution. The biggest concern is not that the parts are in ill health but the impact it has on those of us who have good health, says a leading orthodox Episcopal leader who travels the globe interfacing with the Global South bishops. "We [the orthodox] have been tremendously impacted by what is going on," said Canon Bill Atwood, general secretary of Ekklesia, an organization that links First World Orthodox bishops with bishops in the Global South. "A full page article in a Texas Newspaper said the consecration of V. Gene Robinson had not caused schism. This is nonsense when 21 of the 38 provinces are in impaired or broken communion. That is not schism?" "These Global South bishops have gone on record saying we will not eat with you [Griswold], we will not speak with you [Griswold], and we don't want your money, and that is not schism?" Atwood told deputies to the 16th Annual Assembly of Forward in Faith NA that the leadership of the Episcopal Church was trying to say those things are not there, they are not happening. "But it's a lie, they are happening, and they will continue to happen till Frank Griswold is formally DISCIPLINED by the world's Anglican Primates." "Orthodox people in the ECUSA should be clear about what is happening and going to happen. If we hang together as Anglicans then the Episcopal Church and its leader Frank Griswold must be disciplined with a minimum 'no voice, no vote.' It is impossible to think otherwise." Atwood urged his hearers to talk in their families about what fidelity to the gospel means. "When the family is in crisis it is imperative to be clear. Stand up and be accountable, the stakes are very high." "The direction the Episcopal Church is going is leading people away from Jesus Christ. We are supposed to be leading people to Christ and be transformed by His grace and power. This is an evangelistic imperative; this is a struggle about eternity." "When you understand this then you know why the Global South is so outraged, and they will not be complicit in one person being lead away from Christ and lead to hell. That is the core and heart of the issue of the Global South," he said. Atwood pointed to the paper delivered by West Indies Primate Drexel Gomez which pointed to the theological foundations of realignment. "There are three things that he identifies. The first is that this is a salvation issue. Peoples' eternal souls are being imperiled therefore the wider Anglican Communion cannot be silent." Atwood said that in the Province of Canada, the promise was made for adequate episcopal oversight, and they said they would provide that oversight, but they haven't. It comes with so many strings, that it is not worth the paper it is printed on. The evidence is that Michael Ingham in Vancouver now wants the properties of the faithful and wants them gone. That is tyranny of the worst sort, he told Virtuosity. "We tend to focus on the temporal when we should be focusing on the eternal." Atwood said he had even thought about digging up his parents from a parish that was now revisionist and putting them in more hallowed ground. Atwood said there are African Archbishops laying down their lives for the gospel. "Bishop Objwan in Northern Uganda was recently kidnapped by members of the Lord's Resistance Army. His livestock was stolen his property ransacked. He was rescued by an anti-guerrilla forces in Uganda. He was beaten nearly to death. He is not shrinking back from his diocese because he sees things in terms of eternity." "We can't make our decision on what the outcome of the property will be, but on what the gospels teach and how precious people are." Atwood said people can change the church. "Like raindrops forming a flood, we can change it one drop at a time. The Anglican Communion is in crisis. The Primates will no longer tolerate Western innovations. There have been attempts to sabotage and hijack the African Church with money and offers of education for African priests in revisionist ECUSA seminaries, but they have failed. Gays love to tell touching anecdotal stories about their lives and how they are changing the course of The Faith, but we have a responsibility to really love them...to say no to behaviors that dramatically shorten their lives. The debate needs to be about accountability. Atwood expressed concern about the communion's, four instruments of unity. "These instruments of unity must all step up to the plate or they will no longer continue to be the yardstick of the life and health of the communion. They have lost their moral ground to be called instruments of unity. "What is going to happen? It is impossible to say for sure. The Episcopal Church should repent and at the minimum given 'no voice no vote.' The ECUSA needs to return to the faith once delivered. What happens next...let it be written let it be done." Atwood said the signs are terrifying. "It is agonizing to discipline, but it must be done. If the commission comes through with tremendous resolve then the communion will survive. If it doesn't go through and ECUSA is still defined as a constituent member then the communion as we know it is finished." "The Global South bishops see the issue in simple terms. It might seem bad and schismatic, but they will not pitch their future with ECUSA, the gospel is too important to leave in the hands of revisionist diocese, who have no gospel." Atwood said the Global South bishops are looking to the Network rather than 815 2nd avenue (ECUSA's national headquarters) as they way forward. "They will affiliate with the Network." "What happens if the communion or Rowan Williams are insufficient in their solutions, or they speak sufficiently and ECUSA refuses to repent, there will be a formal separation with many provinces going their own way and forming a new communion." "It is incredibly costly leadership. The question must be asked; Where is your hope? If you have it fixed in a bishop or a priest you have it all wrong. Our only hope is God." "ALL WE CAN DO NOW IS WAIT AND PRAY." END

Church of England Newspaper Evangelical churches are being provided with advice on taking fiscal action against their dioceses that could bring further ruin to the Church of England's finances. Anglican Mainstream has issued guidelines for parishes considering withholding their quota contributions, asserting that such a protest against "unorthodoxy and poor stewardship" is biblically justifiable. A number of parishes in the Oxford diocese warned that they would stop paying their parish share following the selection of Canon Jeffrey John to be Bishop of Reading, and his appointment as Dean of St Albans has provoked renewed financial threats. Two parishes in St Albans have already suspended the entire payment of their quota, and more are considering taking similar action, both in the diocese and across the Church of England. Philip Giddings, convenor of Anglican Mainstream, said that they had been approached by a significant number of parishes asking for guidance in taking financial action. "I have no doubt that a growing number of evangelical churches are considering their position. It is not the maverick churches, but the larger, more mainstream ones that have a track record of high involvement with church structures who are now feeling alienated." The advice given by Anglican Mainstream says that there are a number of situations that would justify financial action. "The first would be if it became clear that all or part of the money involved was being used to support unbiblical teaching or practice." It said that other reasons could be unbiblical action by "the wider Church" or loss of confidence in the financial management of the diocese. In 2003 on average evangelical churches had over double the income of non-evangelical churches, according to Christian Research, and their financial leverage was reported as one of the main reasons for Jeffrey John's withdrawal from the Reading post. A church such as Christ Church, Clifton, pays around £350,000 to central funds each year, only £90,000 of which is returned to pay for the three clergy members. Losing contributions from such large churches would be a serious blow to the Church, which is struggling to overcome the current financial crisis. The Rev David Banting, Chair of Reform, which represents over 2,000 parishes, stressed the reality of the threat. "I have never known it as clear in some people's minds as an active option as it is now," he said. "People are not prepared to fund a Church that doesn't seem to have any sense of discipline or restraint. We are considering playing the money card with a heavy heart. We don't want to do this, but there comes a stage where enough is enough." He pointed to a new scheme, Giving as Partners, as a way that parishes could ensure that withdrawing their quota does not effect the poorer churches. He said that it would redirect a significant proportion of quota payments directly to a needy partner parish. END