Beloved in Christ:
Upon our return from some vacation time visiting family in Florida, I opened the Des Moines Register's religion page featuring an article with the somewhat ungainly headline, "Events on other side of the globe trigger a tricky matter for the Anglican Church." I had, of course, been keeping up with the events described in the article by way of the Internet. Basically, in late January, two primates of the Anglican Communion (Emmanuel Kolini of Rwanda and Moses Tay of South East Asia) along with three other bishops (Ruchyahana of Rwanda, Alex Dickson and Fitz Allison, both retired U.S. bishops) had irregularly ordained two American priests, John Rodgers and Churck Murphy as bishops.
The action was taken, according to the Associated Press release quoted by the Register, because these particular bishops were "vexed over Episcopal Church liberalism, especially the freedom of its bishops to sanction actively homosexual clergy and rituals for same-sex couples" and "as an emergency reaction to the unrebuked ridicule and denial of basic Christian teaching in the Episcopal Church." To that, let me say that, while I understand the frustration of some of my brother bishops around the world at the Episcopal Church's tolerance and diversity and at our way of making decisions sometimes, I completely agree with our Presiding Bishop, Frank Griswold, when he wrote in response to this charge:
"To be sure there are divergent views on the question of human sexuality which are supported by different readings and interpretations of the biblical texts, but in no way is the biblical record treated as other than the word of God "containing all things necessary to salvation...(and) with regard to doctrine, I know of no active bishops who are other than completely orthodox in their understanding of the creeds."
In short, I obviously disagree with the action taken by these bishops, not only because it was based on a false premise (i.e. that there is some kind of "crisis" in the Episcopal Church U.S.A.) but also because it undermines a fundamental unity of the Church in the selection and ordination process for her ministers. Clearly, these new bishops (and I believe they are bishops, at least until some official process of the Anglican Communion deems them not to be so) are not bishops of the American Church. Our bishops are elected by the popular consent of the people of a diocese, approved by a majority of the bishops and Standing Committees of dioceses in the Episcopal Church of the United States of America, and then ordained to that office.
I assume that these new bishops are bishops of the Anglican Church in Singapore and have no jurisdiction in dioceses of the Episcopal Church or the House of Bishops unless we decide to license them to officiate and/or welcome them as collegial members of the House. We will make those decisions in due course. I think it is important to point out that there have been irregular actions taken in the Church before and we have adequate processes in place to handle them and to make good decisions and to deal with such matters. The Anglican Church is a wise and ancient Church, we'll able to deal with diversity and even disagreement in our midst, all the while keeping our eyes focused on "Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of our faith, who for the sake of the joy that was set before him, endured the cross, disregarding the shame, and has taken his seat at the right hand of the throne of God." (Hebrews 12:2)
Meanwhile, discussions concerning scriptural interpretation, how the Bible is to be understood, and complex issues such as human sexuality will continue to be on the agenda of every Christian communion for the foreseeable future. Let us all pray for the gifts of wisdom, knowledge, and discernment and -- above all -- for compassion, as we seek to be faithful to the God who made and loves us all.
Faithfully,
C. Christopher Epting, Bishop
Episcopal Diocese of Iowa
February 5, 2000
Please sign my guestbook and
view it.
Statistics courtesy of WebCounter.