12/08/2007

One of Many Questions re the Bishop of San Joaquin's brief

So Bishop John-David Schofield has led most of his flock down the road and out the door. He made his brief for doing so in his address to the Diocesan Convention. It is an amazing collection of statements with dangling (sometimes tantalizing) questions. Here is an example:

He stated: "Following the historic meeting in Chantilly,(Virginia in 2006) the Primates of the Global South insisted that Bishop Duncan be included in the larger meeting of all the Primates at Dar es Salaam where directives were given to protect orthodox believers within the Episcopal Church."

This makes it appear that Bishop Duncan was included in the larger meeting. He wasn't. He was included in a session specifically arranged as a hearing, not in the regular sessions when the Primates met.

If it were worth it there are other nuggets of bent logic to pursue. I'm not sure it is except to say the whole brief is shot through and through with less than truthful statements.

9 comments:

  1. I was really impressed with the beginning of his address in which he not so subtly likened himself to Moses.

    +Bob Duncan told a reporter from a Sacramento news station that this action was like "changing political parties."

    But, of course, he, and I, and you, and all the clergy of San Joaquin have made vows within this church. In spite of my anger at the rhetoric, it is a kind of nice feeling to be free of such leadership. Perhaps I can even be licensed in the diocese now... at some point several months from now when an interim bishop has been appointed.

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  2. The way that brandishes the change in the lectionary as evidence of TEC's supposed apostasy just doesn't make sense. I guess the Roman Catholic Church and the LCMS didn't get the memo that using it is a hallmark of extreme liberalism.

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  3. "+Bob Duncan told a reporter from a Sacramento news station that this action was like "changing political parties." "

    An atypically frank and revealing comment by a lead player, succinctly stating what the whole mess is really about - "changing political parties".

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  4. On the one hand...It's no mistake that the first diocese to leave is in California - a state with some of the weaker laws (from a national perspective) towards Church Property and denominations and dioceses being able to retain that property which is held in trust for th Episcopal Church. I believe that Ft. Worth, Quincy, and Pittsburgh will wait for case law to be set in California in hopes that that case law will work to their favor in their home states. This is merely act one in a well choreographed play.

    On the other though...
    In many ways though, none of this seems to matter to me. I guess that surprises me a bit. I feel increasingly not bothered by the rantings of of those who have a martyr complex and want to exclude. Let them go. Let them even have the buildings and the money. God will do a new thing and it will be even more amazing than what came before. I'm sure of that!

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  7. Mark - It carries no weight whatsoever to just assert that Bp Schofield's address is a pack of "less than truthful statements" That is slander. You ought to be more careful and precise is defining which statements are less than truthful, and why, with substantial evidence, not simply hearsay.

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  8. If +Schofield's logic holds, then the Episcopal Church was most CERTAINLY "part" of the Nottingham Anglican Consulative Council Meeting -- albeit a "whisked in and out to make our report" part.

    My, my, my!

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  9. "Let them go. Let them even have the buildings and the money."

    Thank you. Glad to go. And, yes, we will see what God will do, on both sides of that aisle.
    Oh, and please let the powers that be at 815 that we have your blessing to leave without being hounded.

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