Bishop Iker and Archbishop Carey,

Thank you, Bishop Iker, for inviting me to respond to your report of your conversation with Archbishop Carey in the hot tub. I have put my response at the end of this message, after the copies of our previous correspondence.

Louie
---------------------------------

>From [Bishop Iker]hFri Oct 11 21:20:40 1996
Date: 11 Oct 96 16:42:54 -0500
From: "Bishop Jack L. Iker" xxxxx
To: Louie Crew lcrew@andromeda.rutgers.edu
Subject: Re: What Bp. Jack Iker said to the ABC in a hot tub?

Yes, Louie, I can confirm that the e-mail message you quote was written by me.

Thanks for asking about it. I look forward to your reply.

+JLI

>From lcrew@andromeda.rutgers.eduSat Oct 12 12:22:06 1996
Date: Fri, 11 Oct 1996 16:24:32 -0400 (EDT)
From: Louie Crew lcrew@andromeda.rutgers.edu
To: [Bishop Iker]
Subject: What Bp. Jack Iker said to the ABC in a hot tub?

Bishop Iker,

This message just arrived arrived in my mailbox. Is it a hoax or did you actually write it and circulate it as shown?

I would like to delay any response until I can confirm your authorship.

Best wishes.

L.

Dear Bill,

I thought you might be interested in a little "hot tub chat" I had with the Abp. of Canterbury at our recent meeting of the House of Bishops.

He joined me for a brief spell in the conference center's hot tub and soon asked, "Do you think +Ed realizes how harmful it would be to the Communion if your next General Convention approves same sex unions and the ordination of practicing homosexuals? It could be very bad for the Lambeth Conference if that were to happen."

I told him that I thought +Ed was more concerned about getting approval for the gay agenda during his time as PB than he was with any unhappiness that would result from it in the rest of the Communion. He said he had thought about talking to +Ed about his concerns, and I encouraged him to do just that before he returned to England.

He reported that Bp. Howe had said that both items were likely to gain enough votes to pass, and I said that I agreed with that appraisal and that Louie Crew was in fact reporting that Integrity had sufficient votes to do it. I tried to impress upon him that +Ed is one of the primary proponents of the gay agenda in ECUSA.

He also asked if they were "really going to make me do it" (i.e., accept the ordination of women). I said that they were indeed determined to make it mandatory at all levels of the church, in every diocese. His response was simply to say that he thought the C of E was dealing with it in a much better fashion and that he hoped we could find another way forward. Is there another way?

At that, he headed for the showers with the parting words, "Hope we can have bath fellowship again one day!"

Peace and blessings,

+Jack Fort Worth

You are bearing false witness. Regarding any new legislation to support lesbigay ordinations, why on earth would I ask for what we already have? In 1994 we passed a canon which guarantees to lesbigays access to the ordination processes.

Since that decision, Bishop Iker and Bishop Howe put the Episcopal Church through an horrendously expensive process to try to prove that bishops who ordain lesbigays are violating ECUSA's laws; yet with a consensus larger than anyone expected, all members of the court except one said that we have no law forbidding such ordinations.

I have not personally reviewed any legislation that might come forward about lesbigay marriages, and I would have to see such documents before I would know whether I would support them. [Update! As of 11/15/96, I have begun a file to collect various reports of ECUSA legislation related to same-sex unions.] Not everybody talking about marriage knows what it is....... How on earth then can I predict votes about the outcome? Meanwhile, I continue to attend lesbigay unions in Episcopal parishes in many dioceses, plus an increasing number of lbg silver anniversaries.

It troubles me that you have broadcast to many people a message which misrepresents my views. I have not put forward any claims about votes on new initiatives, and although I have done the most comprehensive analysis possible on the voting patterns of General Convention last time, I claim to have no crystal ball to tell how the new deputies (39% of all deputies) will vote. I hope that Bishop Howe will explain how he is attributing to me gypsy powers that I do not claim for myself.

Are the three of you possibly passing off your reading of the votes as mine? Persons have tried to stop lesbigay ordinations at each of the last three General Conventions, and each time they have failed by larger margins. If those opposed to them can't stop them, why on earth should those who approve of them ask to have them happen? They are happening and have been happening for years.

Now to a matter much graver still. I should not have to be replying to two bishops gossiping about me in a hot tub. I have several lines on my telephone. The mail still reaches Newark. Before you talk about me, talk with me.

Archbishop, you are a grave offender in this regard in that you talk about me all over the world but have never once sat down to talk with me nor with any groups of lesbigay Christians in ECUSA. Think about that for a moment. Thereby you have risked giving up your moral authority in the lesbigay community. Jesus spent most of his time with folks like me, very little of it chatting in hot tubs with other rabbis.

The Presiding Bishop and my bishop have both urged you to meet with me, and you have persistently refused, although we have been together for days each at two separate conferences.

You stood by silently as some of those addressed by Bishop Iker in this correspondence excoriated me and excoriated my Presiding Bishop for several days at the Kanuga Conference on Evangelism last year, and when I wrote you afterward, you did not give me the courtesy of a personal reply, but sent a note through an underling. Suppose that instead of talking with her Jesus had sent a note to my ancestor at the well telling her how sorry he was that other Jews treated her badly. Samaria would not likely have led the way in conversions, as in fact it did before good news got to the uttermost parts of the earth!

Repeatedly you have come to this country and spoken to our press in contradiction to the views of ECUSA. Would you appreciate my primate doing that in your country? My primate tells me that when he has complained to you, you respond, "I speak only as a British bishop, with no authority here." Indeed you have far less "canonical authority" in ECUSA even than I do, but Sir, do you want to spend your moral capital this prodigally? Do you expect the American people not to give your views more weight than we give to those of just any "British bishop"? Apparently I honor your being Archbishop of Canterbury more than you do.

Most Reverend Sir, your office is far too dignified for you to spurn talking with those whom you gossip about. I have it on good authority that you will be judged by your actions not to those familiar enough to pop into a hot tub with you, but by your actions to those whom you treat as the least among you.

Visit Samaria. Talk with Samaritans. Swill the water from our wells!

Pray for me, a sinner.

Lutibelle/Louie
House of Deputies