Tick, tock.... Midnight coming.

Peter Carrell over at Anglicans Down Under, has written a piece drawing on the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists clock. It is titled, Five Minutes to Midnight. The image from the Bulletin is that it is damn close to fini. The implication is that the same is true for the Anglican Communion. The Clock is ticking, and we need to step back - in this case from the horrors of being an association.


Here is the body of Carrell's text:

One way to think about the Anglican Covenant is that it constitutes a measure of our willingness to be autonomous Anglican churches in communion together in the face of the possibility of formal schism or schisms occurring across the Anglican world. With one measure of the closeness of the world to nuclear conflagration in the background, I suggest that if midnight is the point when we are in schism, then we could assess the arguments for and against the Covenant in terms of minutes before midnight.

In my reading of criticism of the Covenant, most of the criticism stems from an unwillingness to let go of even one iota of autonomy. So when criticism waxes rather than wanes, the likelihood is that Anglican churches, in the end, will go their own way and schism will take place. Right now my assessment is that we are five minutes from midnight!

There is an alternative to schism (as I have been pushing in recent posts): we agree on one thing together, that we are not in fact a Communion and so we will call ourselves something else ... the World Anglican Association, perhaps.

Peter is on the mark in one respect. We Anglicans belong to a fellowship of churches, not a Church. He is wrong, I believe, to suggest that we are not a Communion but rather an Anglican Association.

The problem is, of course, is what we mean by a "Communion." At its core it must such a title must have something to do with communing, with sharing sacraments, understandings of the faith, etc. It is the "etc" that gets us in trouble. Does Communion mean that we must agree on the race of who is ordained, or at least on the separation of those ordained by race? Does Communion mean we must share understanding of whether or not women can be ordained? Does it mean we must share in liturgies that do not deviate from a model, in some cases the 1662 BCP? Does it mean we must all share in the same understanding of divorce and the possibilities of remarriage after? Does it mean that we must all agree not to ordain gay and lesbian clergy who are not celibate, and most particularly bishops?

Well, no. In reality that has not been the Communion from its outset. The notion of unanimity of voice is without merit as a reality in the Anglican Communion. The pissing contest that goes on in TEC and elsewhere as to who is suffering the most is a sad example of the reality that people on one side or the other of this or that snit-fit feel the pain. But pain is not a sign that Communion does not exist, rather it is a sign that the Communion is struggling with real and substantive issues.

We are the Anglican Communion, a fellowship of national and regional churches. No one said it would be easy, or without breakdowns here and there, or without differences in actual practice. But on the other hand, no one told us how wonderful it could be to relate to others across all sorts of divisions and still remain firm friends, sharing bread and wine and the conviction that Jesus Christ is Risen.

We are not just an Association, although we at least that. We Anglicans are more together than that. We are a Communion.

The Haiti Poems

Some time ago I posted a "shameless commerce" item on a book of poems based on experiences in Haiti. Events of the past month have led me to write several new poems, one of which I posted HERE. It is titled, "Requiem for the Dictator."

I've been revisiting some of the poems in the Requiem. Here is one:

A WITNESS

I believe in only isolation
on Haiti’s southern coastal road.
I feel it, jarring as the ruts,
delicate as the light on cane leaves
in the late afternoon.

Still, there is the hint of more,
of beauty seen in people
who suddenly appear beside the road
- not seen exactly, but sensed.

Around the edges of reason's limits,
and in the reach across broad rivers
of injustice, and estrangement,
I see wood nymphs,
satyrs, Pans,
in Haiti.

Raised on brambles,
cactus, sisal, yes,
African born, yes,
borne on Haiti's body
– in them there is the beginning of the new,
the promised Haiti,
the Republic yet to come.

and here is another:

THE PRIESTING.

[Voice 1]
Everyone got out to test the breeze,
look over the lowlands of the coastal plain,
and bless bodies in stretch and sight,
in smell and cool of coming night.

My friend stood in the road:
He lifted high a plastic jug of water
and danced the four points,
splashing the west, the north,
the east and south,
mouth open in laughter,
his eyes in delight.

He was possessed,
dancing around in the road:
Possessed of the liquor of the hills,
the power of the people's incantation
of old spirits, old strange visions.

We had found the secret mountain places
where the spirits who are free are found,
baptized by poverty of the dictator’s attention,
cleansed by the protection of paths
unmapped, without names.

There are souls alive in the hills,
in the back and quiet places
where Haiti still breathes out spirit present,
breathes in spirit all around;
they dreams her old, old dreams.

[Chorus]
And now we are possessed by the voices of the ancient ones
whose bones are our bones, whose blood is our blood.
They ache to speak in all our prayers and dance to the surface.

[Voice 1]
They point the way beyond the words,
beyond the beginning place of intercession.
We say, "Lord in your mercy, hear our prayer,"
but the spirits whisper in our dance,
in our dancing,
in our making trees and hills our elders,
priesting laughing children,
loving sisters, dying old men,
and distantly priesting even the dictator,
lost forever in the presence of the greater spirits
of the people of the hills.

Well... I am thinking of Haiti. Tomorrow will be a month since the earthquake. So much has happened, so much needs to happen now.

Real reconstruction will happen when we remember, as a good friend (the priest in the above) wrote, "Investir au niveau des humains est necessaire avant tout plan de reconstruction physique et materielle." It is, finally, the people who last and are first, if not here, at least in the economy of Christ.

You can order the book, Requiem for the Dictator, here.

Simon Sarmiento assesses AAC acusations. We remember Stephen Bates

Simon Sarmiento has done The Episcopal Church a singular service at a time when it is all the rage to bash TEC as the evil empire and the whore of Babylon. He has written a paper rebutting the American Anglican Council. Thank you Simon.

The American Anglican Council distributed a paper titled, "THE EPISCOPAL CHURCH: OVERBEARING AND UNJUST EPISCOPAL ACTS," written the AAC suggested "The Rev. Philip Ashey, AAC Chief Operating Officer and a practicing attorney, originally authored the 29 page paper at the request of several members of the Church of England's General Synod."

Again, read Simon's rebuttal paper HERE.

Much of the AAC paper is a rehash of an earlier presentation made to the Primates in Tanzania prior to their formal meeting, that paper being titled, "THE EPISCOPAL CHURCH: TEARING THE FABRIC OF COMMUNION TO SHREDS." Philip Ashey was its author as well. This is the same Philip Ashey who wanted to be seated as an member of the Anglican Consultative Council from Uganda at their last meeting. (It didn't work.) Thanks to Simon for this rebuttal.

For some reason it made me think of Stephen Bates' book, "A Church at War." In the last few paragraphs he states the alternatives: "The church will probably choose uniformity of practice over diversity, and prize unity above pearls such as truth and justice... or the church could grow up, challenge the bigots in its midst and allow perhaps for a degree of prophetic vision.... The choice needs to be made, otherwise the church will decline and die in the West and wither in the developing world. But the problem is, some of these people have got Religion."

In growing up it is unfortunately the case that we get into snit fits, some where we are drawn, and some where we draw others in. Getting Religion is one of the way to enter the snit-fit competition. Having religion will do as well. The matter of the numbers of clergy who have been deposed, resigned, or simply walked away from The Episcopal Church provides a playing field on which lobs of mud can be thrown. It is religion at low tide.

What seldom gets mentioned, because it seems somehow tacky to do so, is that the practical necessity of removing clergy from the rolls is determined by fiduciary and legal responsibilities within the Church. There needs to be a way to say you are either part of this church's ordained ministry or not, quite distinct from any issue of ontological standing as ordained. Some clergy are deposed, some resign the ministry of THIS CHURCH, some wander off and are found to have abandoned the ministry of THIS CHURCH.

The snit-fit is that those who leave by these various routes want to maintain that they are indeed bishops and priests, but no longer part of TEC. TEC says, we are not talking about your ontological status, but your status as clergy in this Church. The matter is about license, not status. The person deposed and the person resigning or abandoning this Church may not act in a clerical capacity in this church. What they do elsewhere is a matter for the polity of the community in which they find themselves.

Of course TEC does warn the larger Christian community, by the fact of deposition, and sometime the fact of resignation or abandonment, that the individual in question may present some problems or issues concerning the oaths made at ordination. It is up to the receiving church to determine if the reasons for leaving TEC were in their eyes legitimate, and up to them to determine if the individual is likely to be a problem for them too. So in the end the exact numbers are not the issue. The issue is that TEC , as does any other Anglican church, exercises its licensing role in a variety of way and removes license and the right to be considered a clergy person in this church. Crying, "poor, poor pitiful me" to the General Synod of the Church of England is pretty childish as is thinking that the General Synod folk have not seen the same behavior in thier own clergy who have been deposed, or otherwise stricken from the rolls.

All that remains for others who might take these clergy on is the old and well warn truth, "caveat emptor" - let the buyer beware." And, less there is a fit about this, I have read the list and there are some who I know have left in good conscience and with right reason, but there are others on the list who are more troublesome. There is always wreckage in the fast lane.

The unexamined Covenant is not worth having...etc.

About the time I believe I have heard enough from the Anglican Communion Institute... as for example earlier this week on the publication of its paper, "The Anglican Communion Covenant: Where Do We Go From Here?," which paper I found mostly maddening, something new pops up that brings me up short.

Ephraim Radner has done just that in a follow-up piece to the afore mentioned paper, titled modestly enough, “The Anglican Covenant: Where Do We Go From Here?”: A further comment."

It is worth the read, not because it reiterates the basic (and I think wrongheaded) points of the first paper but because Radner goes on to make some personal observations, most of which speak well of his considerable gifts and vocation as a Christian scholar, an Episcopalian and an Anglican.

Radner argues for a continued engagement with the Anglican Covenant "idea" rather than for what he understands to be the conclusions from the left and right (liberals and traditionalists?) that the Covenant itself defunct. He says,

"Let no one be misled on this point: throw out the continuities of our common life on the front end, and the hope of reconstituting them at the back end is vain. That is not because these continuities are sound in every, or even in many respects; but rather because they represent the means by which personal motives, whatever they are, can be restrained by the Body of Christ, however weakened. The Scriptures, and the Spirit that speaks them, cannot do their work among the self-willed, not because they do not have the power of themselves to accomplish their purposes, but because the “Amen” that is Christ’s answer to this work is given in the common voice not in the predilections of the autonomous."

I think he is basically right here. I don't particularly agree with the flowery, "'Amen' that is Christ's answer to this work..." etc. I am not sure Jesus with two feet on the ground or the Risen Lord would know what to say to our foolishness called Church. But that's another matter.

Radner is basically right to say that Scripture and the Spirit is not best known in the self-willed work of rabid individualism, but in the common work we do in hard and stressful times. I believe our autonomy gets itself expressed in the context of wider engagement, just as I believe that doing justice and loving mercy go hand in hand, and that the autonomy required to take a position is not diminished by staying in the room with those you love but cannot stand. And, without doubt a bit of humble walking seems in order as well.

At the close he writes, "There is still work to be done with this Covenant, and good work at that. There are questions to be raised, resistance in some cases to be offered, and constructive labor to be expended. Speaking for myself, I pray that it be done together, and not in various corners of a pugilist’s ring." That's good stuff!

Radner is concerned that the autonomous voices from the more radical left and right will spin out into a more and more shattered world of Anglican-like bodies and that pleas for common engagement with the serious issues of working to be one in our little corner of Christendom will not be heard.

If what is meant by "autonomous" is stubborn resistance to struggle in common, I agree with Radner's concern. As the matters concerning the Covenant idea and its implementation get more and more heated the temptation is to leave the room, perhaps with notable stamping of feet and righteous indignation. We are all too good at that. Autonomy can become prideful self-will.

At the same time I am a strong believer in the honesty of autonomy. As The Episcopal Church we will do the best we know how with the widest of critical (and sometimes damning) input, but we will finally stand. What does this means for Anglican Communion life? A lot depends on how much our autonomy is viewed by others and ourselves as "autonomy within communion."

We have contributed a great deal to the form of the Anglican Covenant we now have before us. Dr. Radner was in on the foundational work on this Covenant idea and its formation. The development of the Covenant has moved on from the first draft and it looks a good bit different at this point. I don't think he likes where it has gone.

Now we are into the final stretch. Each national or regional church in the Communion is invited to respond. It would deny the reality of autonomy to suggest that our further discussion of the merits of this Covenant, or our possible hesitations about some elements in it, was a sign of disloyalty to the Communion. Far from it: We can only be in Communion to the extent that we are truly willing to be who we are, and if our common life as a church is such that we remain a discomfort to the community of churches called the Anglican Communion, or if we find we cannot in the end join in supporting this specific Covenant, that is precisely what we were asked to reveal and what was expected of us.

All the churches of the Communion are now in the stage where the covenant is to be studies and discussed to the end that each Church might make an informed decision about signing on to it. That will take TEC a few years. It will take other churches shorter or longer.

I would hope that the run to sign on quickly is not taken by Dr. Radner and others as a virtue.

I have not read the constitution and canons of all the churches of the Communion, but I have read several and not surprisingly these constitutions are distinctly constitutions of autonomous churches. No one suggests that these churches are devoid of feelings for communion, both within the Anglican Communion and across the spectrum of christian communities. But those feelings of commonality are not at all to be confused with the distinct character of the churches.

The unexamined Covenant is not worth having, and an examined Covenant might be found wanting. So this is no time to walk away from the conversation. It is no time either to rush to judgment for or against. Ephraim Radner is to be commended for the call to constructive labor. So, come labor on.

I say all of this, of course, and then The Pluralist Speaks comes out with a rousing critique of Radner's paper, the lead character being, "The Reverend Dr. A Frame Reader" who seems clearly to be thinking of Radner as a Anglican Churchillian frump in "A Frame's Defiant Stand in Half." (Both drawings are by Adrain Worsfold)

I love Adrian Worsfold's take-offs, and it appears that some times I rather admire some of what Ephraim Radner has to say. Perhaps in loving these two very different rascals there is a meeting ground after all... we meet where words fall away and people finally stretch a bit, scratch a bit, and wonder together, "what will the next act bring?"

Back to the Bible: Reading Genesis and gathering the Crumbs.

Some detractors of left wing noodle twisting liberals seem to think that we don't read the bible over here on Preludium or in other revisionist hot-spots. To the contrary. I am, as we speak (or write) in the midst of putting together a short Lenten study on doing Justice, using Micah as a baseline. And, because a friend generously gifted me with a copy, I am re-reading for the thousandth time The Book of Genesis. Dr. Harvey Guthrie would (I hope) be proud of my keeping up.

Of course I am reading the version by R. Crumb, the visionary cartoonist of hippie-land and things west of Berkeley. The Book of Genesis, with every word included, none left out, is an amazing work of five years. There are several excellent reviews, including this one in the New York Times and this one by Robert Alter in the New Republic. I am not reviewing here, merely delighting.

This is a fine work with just enough added zest to get us through the begats, every one, with continued interest in the wide range of characters God brings onto the stage and Crumb draws. More, Crumb gives us hints of tears when betrayal happens and grim wonder when circumcision is demanded, frightening possibilities of God's anger and disappointment in the created, and lots of flesh, for after all Genesis is about a lot of begetting and creating.

If this had been available while in seminary, it would have gone well with a bit of wine, the Kinks or perhaps Jefferson Airplane, and Dr. Guthrie's great classes. It would have been great fun.

It still is.

President Bishop Anis bows out of the Standing Committee

One of the members of the Standing Committee of the Anglican Communion has resigned from that body. The result is a considerable ramp up of consternation and confusing messages, notably a paper by the Anglican Communion Institute (ACI), a message from Stephen Noll on Anglican Mainstream's pages, and a wonderful piece by Pluralist Speaks, Adrian Worsfold and of course the pithy words of Jim Naughton at Episcopal Cafe.

The fact: President Bishop Mouneer H. Anis, Bishop of the Episcopal / Anglican Diocese of Egypt with North Africa and the Horn of Africa, also President Bishop of the the Episcopal / Anglican Province of Jerusalem and the Middle East, has stated, "I hereby summit my resignation from the Standing Committee of the Anglican Communion." His full statement can be read by getting the PDF file from the Diocese of Egypt site, HERE.

The frump: He has resigned from the "Standing Committee of the Anglican Communion." There is considerable muttering as to just what the SCAC is. The Anglican Communion Institute says in its own summary of a long paper,

1. The final Covenant text envisions a Communion of responsibly coordinated Instruments, ordered episcopally, that the current ACC-led standing committee is in fact undermining;
2. The current ACC standing committee is not necessarily the “Standing Committee of the Anglican Communion” indicated by the Covenant text, and cannot therefore automatically claim the authority it seems to be assuming;
3. The current ACC standing committee has little credibility in the eyes of a large part of the Communion and ought not to be claiming the authority it seems to be assuming;
4. Those Churches of the Communion who move fully and decisively to adopt the Covenant must work with a provisional and representative standing committee, continuous in membership with the other Instruments, that will direct the implementation of the Covenant in a way that can eventually permit a Standing Committee of the Anglican Communion to be formed as envisioned by the Covenant text.

Much of the ACI paper builds on earlier questions about the Articles of Association, the formation of a UK Charitable Company, the transmigration of titles for some committee from the Joint Standing Committee of Primates and ACC to the Standing Committee of ...what? It is unclear if that is the ACC, or the Anglican Communion, or what. I noted much of this problem in an earlier post, Creeping Big Brother-ism: Why the Joint Standing Committee of Primates and ACC matters. There I said, "given that some may argue that we do need a body to which matters of dispute are referred, why should it be the Joint Standing Committee, a body of individuals representing only themselves at that point?

It may be that the Joint Standing Committee is a really good idea. But unless we talk it out we will never know. But who is interested in giving the JSC, an unexamined body, authority to act as big brother? "

So I agree with part two of the ACI paper. The need for clarity in the matter of "Standing Committee of what?" is there. About the rest of the long ACI Paper? Well, it's a mess.

The ACI, called by Jim Naughton "the four guys with a Web site," is apparently advocating dumping the Standing Committee of the Anglican Communion, which they believe is a committee of the ACC. Jim's comment is right on: "Many Episcopalians have been critical of the Covenant, but they've never advocated anything as radical as what Anis and the ACI have called for tonight." The ACI and the Bishop of Egypt and President Bishop of the Province of Jerusalem and the Middle East are pushing hard. I am not sure they are pushing together, but it is quite remarkable that the Bishop's letter, dated January 30th and the ACI paper, dated January 31st, come so close together.

The ACI paper begins, "We have learned today from Bishop Mouneer Anis that he has submitted his resignation from the former joint standing committee." Well, I know the talented guys with their website can pop off major long papers in almost no time, but I am amazed that they suppose that somehow the paper was written in twenty-four hours in response to his letter. One could just as easily suppose that in conversation with party or parties unknown both the Bishop and the ACI folk arranged a spirited attack on both the Anglican Covenant as proposed and the ACC under whose banner the Anglican Covenant was meant to become the standard for the Anglican Communion. In addition to the effort to trounce the ACC as the core organizing organization for an ongoing office for the Anglican Communion, the ACI is also co-sponsoring a conference titled, "Hierarchy Conference. If the title is unimaginative, the content is very much a matter of the imagination. The work up on the conferences reads this way:

“Who’s in Charge—Hierarchy and the Episcopal Church” is a conference designed to consider the governing structure of The Episcopal Church. Experts with theological, historical, legal and ecumenical training will evaluate how appeals to ‘hierarchy’ compare and contrast in different church bodies. At issue is whether the term requires definition and differentiation due to the historical and ecclesial realities facing respective church bodies. Does hierarchy mean the same thing for Roman Catholic, Presbyterian, Methodist, Anglican and American Episcopal Churches, and if not, how might we best understand the unique governing structure of The Episcopal Church? The question demands careful assessment because this is a period of contestation when claims to represent the polity of The Episcopal Church are being lodged." It should be an interesting time for all. The ACI is off tilting at windmills in hopes that at some point they will scare the hell out of those of us who believe in episcopal authority but don't believe it rests solely with bishops to exercise that authority and that we will cave in and decide, what the hell, they are the bishops, let them govern.

Of course the wonder of that cave-in is that the whole of governance gets put in the hands of bishops - not The Episcopal Church house of bishops, but bishops throughout the whole communion, were as some are wont to point out the GAFCON sentiment wins out. No, the end of all this hierarchical talk is to negate the authority of local synods (those of national or regional churches) and to transfer that authority to a world wide synod expressed in representation by the Primates. The object is to move the center of the Anglican Communion from its one synodical body, however imperfectly formed, to the Primates and the Bishops at Lambeth. The losers are the Archbishop of Canterbury and the Anglican Consultative Council. In reality the losers are those who believe in the ABC as a focus of unity (even when he doesn't seem too focused) and the ACC as a synod of churches. Well, there it is, planning in the plains of ecclesastical id for a major turn to hierarchical sanity focused in the witness of the GAFCON types, with the suggestion of a new and improved Anglican Covenant that would exclude the unworthy or the slow to sign-on from being part of the actual governance from the outset. One could weep and wail and carry on about how important this all is.

But I will show you an even more excellent way. As they charge with their lances tipped with steel hard logic and thundering verbiage, give way, stepping to the side and then away, aside and then away. Let them pass by. No need to linger. There is nothing much to see there.


Which is too bad, since at least part of the ACI argument is right. The new Standing Committee (of the ACC of the Anglican Communion, whatever) is a bad idea supposedly justified by United Kingdom civil law.

Poor Bishop Anis actually said some things in his letter that warrant our further consideration, but things have moved on. His resignation is the point, his points are not.

Still, consider: He writes, "I have come to realize that my presence in the current SCAC has no value whatsoever and my voice is like a useless cry in the wilderness." "I have come to the sad realization that there is no desire within the ACC and the SCAC to follow through on the recommendations that have been taken by other Instruments of Communion to sort out the problems which face the Anglican Communion, and which are tearing its fabric apart. Moreover, the SCAC, formerly known as the Joint Standing Committee (JSC) has continually questioned the authority of the other Instruments of Communion, especially the Primates Meeting and the Lambeth Conference."

Well there's the rub. Bishop Anis believes SCAC and the JSC (which was of both the Primates and the ACC Standing Committees) are the same thing. How does ACI account for that. Oops, they are not after all on the same page.

The good bishop does realize something that I wrote about earlier in my piece on the Standing Committee... that it has become essentially a fifth instrument of communion, one which suppose to speak for at least two of the instruments - the Primates and the ACC - when they are not meeting. This is indeed a bad idea.

He then complains, "The current SCAC provides no effective challenge to the ongoing revisions of TEC nor does it apply the recommendations of the Windsor Report and the Primates Meetings..." He has an extensive footnote as to just what recommendations he speaks of. And, no surprise here, it edits out those having to do with intervention by one Church in the life of another without permission. Bishop Anis then complains that there are provinces participating in the decision making processes of the Communion "who turn their backs on every appeal and warning."

Better he suggests, that "the participation in the decision making process that affects the life of the Anglican Communion should be for those who show respect in word and deed to the whole Communion." What he means, dear friends, is that the ACC and the Standing Committee should expel those who disagree with the GAFCON primates. He would wish that ACC and the SCAC would throw TEC representatives out. This inclusive stuff is in his mind a ruse. He feels excluded, so his response is to wish that we were excluded.

Now to be fair, no one, as far as I know, has suggested that Bishop Anis should not be on the Standing Committee just because he supports the interventions by other Provinces in the workings of TEC. And, now that I think about it, he has had every opportunity to make his case at Lambeth, at the Primates meetings, in ACC and SCAC, etc. It is not that he is marginalized for matters having to do with language, ethnicity, theological position or even sexual orientation. He is, apparently, marginalized, if at all, for not haveing a good enough set of arguments to "win" enough of the time to satisfy him.

Bishop Anis took the time to express his personal views in his letter - more personal apparently than his feelings of marginalization.

He thinks there is an effort to question and diminish the authority of the Primates and the Lambeth Conference. He is right. When resolutions of one or the other of these groups are raised to the level of dogma, it is time to question authority. Tough. I am sure he has sufficient authority in his own Church. Let it be.

He thinks the current version of the Anglican Covenant is weaker than former versions because it cannot solve the current crisis. Right. If the Covenant were there to solve the current crisis it would be straightforwardly a means of punishing several churches for their actions in the past.

He suggests that "Provinces who violate the spirit of the Covenant should not be allowed to sign or adopt the Covenant in the first place." OK, just what do you believe is "the spirit of the Covenant," who do you suppose should make that judgment, and just who do you have in mind, bishop? This is so contrary to the work done on the Covenant that it is scary.

He believes dioceses in provinces that "do not want to adopt the Covenant, or delay the process of adoption," should be allowed to adopt the Covenant. By which I suppose he means, any Province that doesn't hop on board right now is doomed to have its on unity dissolved by local option.

The really big noise, however, is in item D of his suggestions. Bishop Anis states, "According ot Section 4.1.6, "the Covenant becomes active for a Church when that Church adopts [it]" The implication of this would be that when a majority of provinces have adopted the Covenant, they should then elect new representatives to the Anglican Consultative Council and the Standing Committee of the Anglican Communion. The current ACC and SCAC should resign." Well, he certainly is imaginative. There is no such implication. If there were it would be reason enough for every Province to reject the Covenant. This is hogwash.

Bishop Anis then turns his gaze to the Listening Process. He says, "in our Communion where some churches depend financially on others, there is no guarantee of a fair, two-way listening process." There is no doubt that financial dependency breeds careful words and that real engagement between churches and peoples needs to break free of such constraints. That is a real and valuable matter to engage. But it is a sham argument as concerns the Listening Process. The purpose of the "Listening Process" was not to guarantee debate privileges to two parties. It was to make it possible for gay and lesbian persons in the various part of the Communion to be heard, often when listening as well as speaking was punishable by fine, imprisonment or death. I believe on the whole that process has been a failure, but that is another issue. The Bishop is raising the "poor, poor, pitiful me" flag and it is unworthy of him, the courage of his convictions or the truth. It is bogus.

He grouses about the western structure and staffing of the Anglican Communion Office and its use of IT rather than face to face and telephone communication. Right, and getting off the Standing Committee serves this end exactly how?

Well, at least the Bishop of Egypt, northern Africa and the Horn of Africa, believes that the Anglican Communion has a future, a future placed in the Global South where growth is taking place. His Province is no clear example of such growth, but we know what he means. The future growth of the various national and regional Churches in the Anglican Communion will in the near future numerically favor the churches in parts of the Global South.

It may well be that some of them will want to organize around different principles than those provided by the Anglican Communion, with its four or five instruments of unity, wide differences in values and understandings and dispersed authority. So be it.

In which case I am glad he resigned. As with those who have left the Episcopal Church, Go with God. Try not to destroy what you are leavinging, and by the way, don't call your new thingy The Anglican Communion. The name is already taken.

Out near the edges it gets strange....

The quirky far edge of splinter-land gets stranger and stranger. Googling today for ACNA, the Anglican Church in North America, I found this site: The Conservative Anglican Church in North America. It seems to be a ministry in collaboration with something called Set Free Ministries, International, which is primarily located in to places in India and one in Texas. CACNA and Set Free Ministries International have formed St. James University in Florida.


CACNA is apparently bishop led, but by whom we do not know. Some unidentified bishop looking person is positioned off to the right on the web page.

It is all very strange. I am sure it gives ACNA and its Archbishop no great pleasure to know that springing forth from the fountain of creativity in splinter-land ACNA now has a conservative alternative. (I thought they already were the conservative alternative...)




Over in other parts of splinter-land other bits and pieces of "special" stuff arises as well. One of the most precious is this item, available on Cafe Press, an "Archbishop Robert Duncan Ornament (Oval)The Anglican Church in North America on October 09, 2009 at 11:33 AM. It doesn't show up on the "store" sub menu of the ACNA pages, but there it is. Put on Cafe Press by ACNA. Special, isn't it? ACNA is indeed bishop led, and ACNA seems to have no trouble in naming him and giving him visibility.

What is there to say? Not much.

Haiti on my mind, and not much else, except Arnold

For the past twelve days I've been able to do very little except to think of Haiti, a country and people that I love. Added to that I've lost a good friend, Arnold, whose heart gave out after a long fight.

For forty-five years Haiti has been on my mind and often the ground I walked on. Beginning in 1968 and roughly every two years thereafter I have visited Haiti or our good friends from Haiti have visited us. I was last a guest three years ago in their house just outside Port au Prince. Kathryn was there year.

Each time I visited them I also visited with church people, went to church, visited the bishop and generally hung out with the people of this vibrant and fascinating church. And, also, because I was visiting people in both church and society there was the matter of political and church processes. Over the years I have known the last three bishops - Voegeli, Garnier and Duracin (a short history of the Church in Haiti can be read HERE. I have been in the country under François Duvalier, his son Jean Claude, a variety of military and civilian heads of state and Jean-Bertrand Aristide.

The church began as an independent church. It became part of The Episcopal Church as a last resort, and grew from being a missionary diocese to being the church it is today. Since becoming part of The Episcopal Church it has been funded by major grants each year from TEC. The foundational grant has primarily paid the salaries of clergy and the grant has effectively made them the primary missionaries of the Haitian Episcopal Church. The church there has been a gift to the whole church. The Episcopal Church of Haiti has become a hope to the nation.

The nation could use some hope. The various forms of governance, including occupation by the US Marines and dictatorships both, has been disasters. Added to that are the natural disasters, the systematic shunning of Haiti by most of the world, the abject poverty of a large part of its population and the corruption of its own leadership and the resulting mess seems at times hopeless. On the terrible punishment exacted for daring to be a free people and black, see THIS ESSAY.

The dismal science of theological causality has been depressing to say the least. Depressing and sad. People keep wanting to explain it all. There is no reason to it, save the operation of natural systems whose 'reason' are the natural consequence of large bodies of material rubbing against one another. Earthquakes happen. Bad theology seems to relish the opportunity to explain just why this catastrophe had to happen to this people. Humbug.

It is no wonder then that people are given to wanting to explain it all. But I must confess their explanations are totally unsatisfactory and often so unsound as to be unChristian or antiChristian and depressing.

In the past few days a variety of models have sprung up to help us make sense of the latest injury to Haiti, the earthquake of twelve days ago.

There are those who believe the earthquake is a sign of God's punishment of the people of Haiti for their sins, and in particular for a "pact with the devil" or voodoo religion. Those who have proposed this will have their reward.

There are those who propose that the magnitude of the disaster is somehow a result of the poverty of the people whose buildings are sub-standard and infrastructure so fragile, and that therefore the meaning of all this is bound up with the corruption of Haiti's government. And where the hell were these people when the country slowly sank into disarray?

And now there are those who propose that the earthquake is related to particular mission operations in Haiti. Stand Firm reports "..a Christ Church priest said ... the reason we've been over there working for the past 30 years is precisely because of this present time. It appears that God has allowed the little village of Cange to have an infrastructure of healthcare, education, enterprise, and water far beyond "normal and reasonable" in part because of this time and this crisis." The mission he refers to is, by the way, very much worth the support as is the work of Paul Farmer. But in the SF article the implication of cause is drawn and that is odd at best and mean spirited at worse. (note from comments - a reader who was there states that the priest did not make that implication and that his remarks were in support of what the parish is doing in Haiti - a totally commendable witness, by the way. It appears that "the implication" was not that of the priest, but of the SF writer. I have corrected the sentence above with the inserted red letter words. I apologize to the Christ Church priest for taking the report of others without having any way to further check on the matter.)

Sarah Hay, writing at SF, says, "This morning I had another good conversation with another person -- this time an Episcopal priest in another diocese -- who helpfully pointed out to me as I struggled to learn more that, as with so much of Anglicanism, there is a Church/State imbroglio in Haiti that is . . . difficult. Couple that also with the country's history and the government's issues, and the implications of the diocese of Haiti's connection with The Episcopal Church, and one has a very dire and impossibly complex situation. This priest also pointed out that, thankfully, there have been small, entrepreneurial "missions" that have managed to both circumvent the political and theological entanglements, and also yield massive and impressive results."

The priest of the parish in question, Fr. Lafontant, is a priest of the Diocese of Haiti. The annual appropriation of The Episcopal Church supports the salaries of all the clergy in Haiti. Fr. Lafontant is very much part of TEC, having been trained, ordained and put in place by the Diocese of Haiti and TEC. To suggest that the work of his mission is an example of "small, entrepreneurial missions" separated out from TEC is absurd. But more importantly, it is using the earthquake as prooftext of the "good" missions done apart from TEC and "bad" mission somehow done by TEC. Missing is any sense that the Diocese of Haiti IS TEC in Haiti.

The earthquake and the emerging realities in Haiti require that we shake loose from such rubbish. It is time to move beyond the question, "why?" and expecting some theologically based causal connection. It is time to move beyond the use of this event to shore up this or that mission activity or to cast stones at one party or another. The first is arrogantly anti-Christian, the second is astoundingly childish.


It is time to get on with the resurrection.

It is time to get on with some serious long term questions: Are the international church and governmental agencies - from relief and medical agencies to local missions - willing to rebuild WITH Haitians rather than FOR Haitians? Do they / we have any trust in the will and spirit of the Haitian people and their own ability to govern and grow? (photo to right (c) by Chris Harris)

If we do not then what will happen is relief, rebuilding and aid always dependent on these agencies, and sure as God brings the rain, it will pour somewhere else and the agents will leave Haiti. If we do then we must learn to truly give - not just rice, but rice seed that does not require buying from foreign agents again, not just wheat brought in from America's harvest but local crops grown by Haitians, for Haitians. If we do then we must learn to work to retool and re-energize Haitian workers, teachers, medical people, through Haitian institutions, so that in the end it is their Hospitals and Schools that are producing sound nurses, doctors and teachers. If we do it is Haitian clergy and parish workers who will be the missionaries on the ground, not us.

Can we receive from the Haitian people and Church, or are we always to be the givers? Remembering that it is more blessed to give than to receive, when will we take seriously what we can receive from Haiti, so that the blessing of giving is not ours alone.

If we do not find ways to receive, then we are miserly concerning giving blessing. In all the massive outlay of goods and services and time and energy following the earthquake, where is the question taken up concerning our willingness to receive, and therefore bless. In the very long run what we do now will be aid, gratefully received, and we will be blessed. But poor Haiti, always receiving, always blessing, never blessed. We who give will receive a blessing, but when will we give one? Only when we have also received.

It is a strange spiritual economy: that we seek one another's blessing as God's blessing on us, but we don't easily attach that to receiving. Remember the sign, "The Episcopal Church welcomes you." In Haiti, in Port au Prince, in a field next to College St. Piere, the Episcopal Church has welcomed people camping in tents and under awnings and out in the open. The Church has indeed been blessed by them. When the Church knows what an honor it is to have these visitors, it blesses them. When will we come to know that when we were moved to provide aid and comfort, the honor is all ours, and rise up and bless the people of Haiti for giving us such joy? Perhaps when those who live in the field one day live again in houses and have a sign on their door that says, "Episcopalians welcomed here."

And then there is the death of Arnold, good friend. I led the service for him today.

Arnold gave of himself, and sometimes it seems clear that he is the blessed one, having given so much of himself. And so I bless him, and feel strangely bereft. But we were friends, and I gave of myself to him as well, and I know his blessing me. Such talk might give have made Arnold itch, but he knows and I know we blessed one another because we gave and received both. The reciprocity of blessing - of giving and receiving - is just a bit like a foretaste of the banquet to come.

So perhaps the answer to all this depressing mess is reciprocal blessing - where giving and receiving work themselves out in a joyful sharing. It is time to move on with living, and bless one another in giving and receiving both, while there is still time. Sounds like Resurrection time...just in time.

“There Is No Gay Gene”...oh yeh?

The Living Church, whose efforts have at times in recent months become a bit pretentious, outdid itself today by the headline, "Dr. Paul McHugh: “There Is No Gay Gene”.


Little did we know that relief from the terrors of a gay bishop, The Rt. Rev. V. Gene Robinson, could be overcome by a simple declarative sentence, "There is no Gay Gene."


The mind boggles. Perhaps someone could declare, "There is no Straight Gene." Then all us straight guys who don't measure up to being macho-straight could relax. There is no Straight Gene, so we don't have to be, well, you know, muscular about it all.


So there is no Gay Gene. Is there a Straight One?


Wait, wait.... I really don't care. There are gay people. That's a fact, Jack. Life is short, and arguments are long. Everyone is sexually expressive by circumstance, and how we are plumbed and why is only part of the variants to be dealt with.


At least that's my take on a tired Tuesday night after a funeral and preparations for the death of a friend and the profound knowledge that love is not the prisoner of any genetic propensity, plumbing or predilections.


I love who I will well or badly, and am loved in return with similar limitations. I am convinced that Jesus loves me, for the bible tells me so. That's enough for me. What do I know from genes?


That's my story and I'm sticking to it.

Is there no end of rotten theological analysis of Haiti's plight?

Pat Robertson is an ass. Most notably he repeated a few days ago the sort of propaganda that arose in the United States, particularly in the slave holding states, that Haiti could not have succeeded in its revolution if it had not made a pact with the devil and that Haiti would forever be plagued by its fall from grace. The word was that Haitians are ignorant black pagans and unworthy of independence. That same propaganda continues even now. Aid will too easily be accompanied by the underlying message that Haitians cannot govern themselves or make it as a nation or a people.

So it is no wonder, although immensely sad, to see a more learned but similar response reported by Ruth Gledhill in an article, "Voodoo faith 'could hinder Haiti's recovery from quake'. The article is built from comments by Lord Griffiths of Fforestfach, who no doubt loves Haiti and its people. He unfortunately is given to yet another rotten bit of theological analysis.

Gledhill reports,

"Lord Griffiths said: “The Haiti people have had so many batterings that when something terrible happens, they just say, “Bon dieu bon", or “God is good”, whatever happens. In other words, it is God’s will, we must accept it, there is nothing we can do about it.

“The task for Christian evangelism is not to make voodoo worshippers into Christians but to help deal with the fatalism that does not allow voodoo worshippers to see themselves as agents of their own improvement.

"The problem is the competition between these two mindsets, the fatalism that says they can do nothing and the right perception that they can do a lot. That is the spiritual struggle.”

God is good, by the way. It is not fatalism to believe that that is true, even in the midst of terrible suffering. And, if my own observations from more than fifteen trips to Haiti over the past forty years are at all true, the high energy and amazingly creative efforts for survival of Haitians in the midst of poverty and calamity is not a sign of fatalism or lack of a sense that they can be agents of their own improvement.

The instant analysis that Haitians are somehow deficient because they practice voodoo is another charge in the line up that suggests that Haitians cannot govern themselves and that they are impoverished because they are evil, foolish or dumb.

The real charge against Haiti and its people is the unforgivable sin of revolt by black people against their oppressors and that charge creeps back in to the religious analysis of those who would offer aid, but with the caveat that aid is needed because the poor Haitian is incapable of salvation or recovery without the advanced aid of Christian belief and white people.

The whole thing is sick, and the beginnings of that sickness is the notion that God did this to the Haitian people. But the next bit of the sickness is that because Haitians are not "good" Christians they will fail at recovery.

I do not believe God did this to the Haitian people. I do believe that God is good. I don't believe that practicing voodoo (whatever that means) makes people fatalistic and unable or uninterested in improvement. I do believe we should offer all the support we can for the people of Haiti and help them recover. But dear friends it will be THEY who recover.

Perhaps we one day will also recover - from the belief that those who have are somehow better blessed by God and that purified and rarefied protestant Christianity is somehow breeds positive action.

Meanwhile, perhaps we could do without the rotten theological analysis of Haiti's plight. There is enough to do without having to deal with such foolishness. Give - through Episcopal Relief and Development and other sources.

Pray for the people of Haiti. And let's try not to forget them when the next crisis averts our eyes once again from this amazing people whose only international crime was to be black and free.

All that is left, block upon block...Holy Trinity Cathedral

Philipe Qualo sent out these pictures which got to me by way of Pere Yvan Francois now in Florida.

They are pictures of a pile of rubble, all that is left of Holy Trinity Cathedral in Port-au-Prince, a place of beauty and rest in the midst of the City, now dust.






And still we know that there will arise from this rubble some new flower...The Bishop, Bishop Jean-Zache Duracin, is now camped out on the grounds of College St. Pierre in Port-au-Prince. Some reports say that he has gathered about 1000 people into this a makeshift community there.

Pray for the Bishop and people, the people of the camp and the city and the country.

“Beni Swa Leternel" : "Blessed be the Lord.”

Reporting on the first full day following the earthquake in Port au Prince, Simon Romero, writing for the New York Times ended his report with this amazing image:

"With no electricity, stars offered the only illumination in the city, which, with its suburbs, is home to nearly 3 million people. For some of those lying on the asphalt or in the parks, cellphones provided a brief glimpse of light.

Then the singing began. Those gathered outside tents, on lawn chairs, sitting in the middle of empty streets, sang their hymns. One phrase in Creole could be heard repeatedly both inside and outside the hospital walls, as if those voicing the words were trying to make sense of the madness around them.

“Beni Swa Leternel,” they sang. “Blessed be the Lord.”

May the faith of the people of Haiti carry them through the terrible times to come.

Seeing the picture of Holy Trinity Cathedral yesterday I was reminded of the time many years ago now when I celebrated mass at six in the morning on weekday there. There were about fifty people, birds in the rafters, the wondrous murals on the walls, the sweet smells of a new tropical day, two earnest acolytes and me with my rotten French. It was perfect. The report is that the Cathedral, like the Roman Catholic one, has collapsed. The murals I suppose gone, along with the schools and so much else. And then we wait on news from friends. We have heard from several, who, thank God, are safe. But the wait goes on for news of others.

"Blessed be the Lord," is a word of hope and also a word of consolation in the time of the passing away of the old and the death of loved ones. There will be need for such consolation in the days to come.

RAMA: Weeping for Haiti

RAMA

Jer. 31:15 Ainsi dit l'Éternel: Une voix a été ouïe à Rama, une lamentation, des pleurs amers, Rachel pleurant ses fils, refusant d'être consolée au sujet de ses fils, parce qu'ils ne sont pas.


It appears that somewhere deep below Carrefour,
near Port au Prince
the North American and Caribbean plates
moved after two centuries of tense engagement.

Six miles up, at four fifty-three in the afternoon,
January 12th, Rachel began anew to weep for her children.

The sun was blotted from the sky
and the dust rose
and the night came
with agony in the buildings
and anguish in the streets.
It was day and night, the first day.

Rachel's people,
They are no more,
All have gone down,
Down with the presidential palace,
Down with the churchly palace,
Down with the all the places of block and mortar,
Down to death.

Day has come again
and still, Rachel weeps
and in the hovels of Cite Soleil,
and the villages back in the hills
where the shacks and houses
are wood, and loose,
The poor remain.

A terrible old man on TV
Thinks Haitians made a pact with the devil
And now are paying the price.

Haitians believe black and free
Can be conjoined ideas,
and for that idea
which white men said was of the devil
they have been paying the price ever since.

And Rachel has been paying the price forever,
And the weeping now is the weeping then,

It is easier to simply say the tectonic plates have moved
And earthquakes happen
than it is to say much else.

Yet somehow it seems injury on top of insult
That Rachel’s children pay for being black,
And free, and simply six miles up from moving plates.

No, better they not pay back,
not one gourde,
not to the man, not to the God
of physics and geology,
not to the accidents of history.

Better Black, free, and standing
than obligated by catastrophe.

Rachel weeps, and then gathers
The children of the streets
And begins again
To find the republic for which
The children dream,
and God dreams.

Unconsoled, but not without recompense,
there is now a time of waiting in Rama,
and then a new day.

Akinola interview: Credit where credit is due.

Archbishop Akinola is often the subject of critical comment here on Preludium, and for good reason. But there have been times when we have urged people to look also at the Archbishop's willingness to speak out against the corruption of the state and corporations and against the excesses of certain church practices.

In an interview for the Church of Nigeria webpages, Archbishop Akinola speaks to several state and religious issues with force and humor. It is worth the read.

Here are some tidbits from the interview:
About the "Gospel of Prosperity":

"A large number of preachers today do not seem to see anything wrong in proclaiming what they call the gospel of prosperity and lay emphasis from the beginning to the end of their sermons, on how to make so called break through, get their miracles and getting more money and all that. I am not against earning money nor getting wealth after all, we all need money to do what we need to do both for ourselves and the Church of God. But when that becomes the focus of our message, the pivotal of our service and the centre of our lives, it is wrong."

About church silence concerning the wrongdoing of public officials:

"And concerning politicians, how many leaders in the Church do we hear in recent times telling them that what they are doing is wrong. Very few, if any. That is what I call conspiracy of silence, not just by the Pastors but all other stake holders like the media, lawyers, engineers, accountants among others."

About Pentecastalism:

"Our Church has always been a Church led by the Holy Spirit. We believe very firmly in the authority and supremacy of the scriptures. We also believe very firmly and strongly in the historical establishment of the early Church. Anglican Communion did not just fall down by the corner yesterday. We have been part of the Catholic i.e. Universal Church for the past 2,000 years.

So we have history and antecedents. Therefore as an offspring of the early Church, we try not to over-emphasize one thing over and against the other. We maintain a very lively balance between what is scriptural, historical and reasonable. You will not see us rolling on the floor, doing acrobatic claiming to be under the power of the Holy Spirit.

Everything we have ever done in this Church and still doing today has been made and still being made possible by the Holy Spirit. He is the way and without Him, we have no way. So, we believe very strongly that this manifestation of the Holy Spirit is always there and always guiding, leading and enabling the Church to grow and move on. The Holy Spirit cannot be caged for anyone to say this is the particular way He should operate. He moves as He pleases and does what glorifies our Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ and not individuals.

Sometimes, He enables people to pray and healing happens. In another place, He enables people to preach the Word and sinners are converted. We have heard testimonies from some of our new dioceses where they preach and those into idolatry brought out their shrines and destroyed their idols. Without the Holy Spirit, this is practically impossible. We have also heard testimony of communities that had been at war for years, reconciled. All these are by the power of the Holy Spirit. So, in the Anglican Church, we try to maintain a balance. They Holy Spirit enable all that we do and we try not to over emphasize a particular way of the work of the Holy Spirit by making special reference to what is called Pentecostalism or whatever."

Read the interview.

Two questions for the bishop visitors to Canada.

According to the Anglican Journal, the so called pastoral visitors from the Archbishop of Canterbury, "...noted “a widespread sense of weariness with the whole business of same-sex blessings,” as well as a “palpable desire to get on with the business of mission."

Two questions:

(i) Did the visitors think that perhaps the weariness "with the whole business of same-sex blessings" might be somehow related to the very human desire not to have to do the hard work of change?

Unaccompanied by any further observation their remarks on weariness are no pastoral help at all.

They noted a "palpable desire to get on with the business of mission."

(2) Did the visitors have any sense that perhaps there might be a relation between blessing commitments by and among people and the business of mission, which seems to include restoring "all people to unity with God and each other in Christ"?

The "business" of mission is not at all limited to going somewhere else and mucking about in the name of Christ (as perhaps the pastoral visitors themselves might view their work). Mission is about unity expressed in ways that pastoral visitors for the "instrument of unity," that is the Archbishop of Canterbury can hardly match.

The hard work that has been occasioned by the hope of committed Christians that their relationships might be strengthened by blessing is itself a work of mission.

The Incarnation eventually has to be imaged with Christ having an Asian nose, or as black African, or as Navajo, or as a woman, or as Gay, because if it can't be so imaged, then it can't be imaged as inclusive of pasty-gray balding straight (although increasingly bent) guys like me.

We are restored to unity as Christ is seen by each of us in all of us, and God is all in all.

At least that's how I see it.