According to the Living Church article, The Presiding Bishop named the names of those who had behind-the-scenes roles at the Primate's meeting: Bishop Robert Duncan, Canon Bill Atwood, Canon Martyn Minns, Canon David Anderson, Canon Kendall Harmon, Ms. Diane Knippers.
In 2003 I wrote the following:
"There are snakes in the churchyard. There are dirty tricks being played out at every turn. There are learned and trumpeted declarations concerning the unconstitutionality of the work of General Convention. There are bogus arguments about how we are bound by the counsel of higher authorities in the Anglican Communion. What they are trying to do is change the understanding of what constitutes the Anglican Communion. For we may be very sure that if they were to succeed the Anglican Communion would indeed become a Church and would cease to be a fellowship." (see http://www.rci.rutgers.edu/~lcrew/dojustice/j085.html
That statement comes home in the current naming of names, and I am glad the Presiding Bishop was able to express his concern about them.
I know Bishop Duncan. He was wonderfully helpful to me both pastorally and personally and a good friend in the past. I know Diane Knippers who has been at times a strong advocate for the oppressed in the Sudan. I have had good and heartfelt conversations with Kendall Harmon. I respect each of these people as persons of great conviction, convictions that I do not in most ways agree with. It is therefore difficult to say this, but I have already. (See http://anglicanfuture.blogspot.com/2005/03/insult-and-bad-manners-by-primates.html ) Their presence and actions "behind the scenes" at the Primate's Meeting was quite outrageous.
The report in The Living Church suggests that Bishop Duncan was "not present during the Presiding Bishop's remarks. I get the sense from several reports that Bishop Duncan only attend the House of Bishops these days when he can speak to the particulars of this or that issue he wishes to address and not otherwise. This is perhaps true of some other Network Bishops.
At what point do the rules of the House of Bishops, the rule of the chair, or even good sense in general suggest that bishops who absent themselves from the regular meetings of the House, particularly if hanging around for the proper time to intervene, loose their "point of personal privilege" status and indeed their seat?
3/17/2005
1 comment:
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Mark, the problem with what you have written is that it does not correspond to what happened.
ReplyDeleteFirst, Bishop Salmon says my name was not mentioned in Texas, other bishops say it was, so I am unaware of whose name was actually was mentioned since I was not there.
Second, I arrived in Ireland Thursday in the early evening, and had no involvement at all in the Primates meeting.
It is sad to me that there is so much false information going around, but there we are. I hope we could at least check things first without make unfounded accusations.