Please sign the guestbook and view it.

Louie & Ernest Clay-Crew
Married February 2, 1974


12/21/1974
 
8/17/2006

Integrity, Beyond Inclusion, and The Oasis Organizations committed to realizing the full inclusion of lesbian, gay, and bisexual people in the life of the Episcopal Church

March 11, 1999

Joint Statement: For Immediate Release

Reaction to the House of Bishops Call for No Vote on Sexuality at General Convention 2000

Our organizations react with alarm and objection to reports that the House of Bishops of the Episcopal Church, meeting in Texas, alluding to the development of a a strategy to avoid legislative action on issues of human sexuality at the 2000 General Convention. In particular, we make the following observations:

Once again the Church appears out of touch as the nation mourns the brutal murder of another gay man; the silence of a pastoral word from our bishops speaks volumes.

Once again the bishops appear to have forgotten that the church is more than the episcopal order, but a collaborative endeavor of laity and clergy. Specifically, they seem to have forgotten that they are only one House of the General Convention.

Bishop Griswold has stated that this delay of votes is in the spirit of the year Jubilee. We disagree. The biblical year of Jubilee was a year of justice and liberation. The contemplative life of Jesus always drove him to acts of justice and liberation. His inaugural sermon (Luke 4) included the call to Jubilee: "to let the oppressed go free."

Our vision of General Convention includes conversation, but not to the exclusion of taking stands on the many issues of justice that are before us. We remember another voice from Texas, former presiding Bishop John Hines. During the bleakest days of the battle for desegregation in Texas, he declared that a bishop's job is to keep the church on "the firing line" of the world's most desperate needs. And he said to his clergy, "You are involved in this by virtue of your commitment to Christ in this world. You are committed to stand and deliver even if it breaks peoples' hearts and causes considerable despair."

Contacts: Integrity Michael W. Hopkins, President, 301-262-3285; e-mail: StGeoGD@aolcom
Beyond Inclusion Rebecca Omahan, National Director, 626-583-2740; e-mail: romahan@allsaints-pas.org
The Oasis Elizabeth Kaeton, Executive Director, 973-430-9909; e-mail: EMKaeton@aol.com

• Louie Crew's Anglican pages: http://newark.rutgers.edu/~lcrew/rel.html
• Louie Crew's home page: http://newark.rutgers.edu/~lcrew
• Send mail to: lcrew@newark.rutgers.edu

Please sign my guestbook and view it.

Statistics courtesy of WebCounter.