An Important View of Mission and Covenant

This is from the "presidential address" of Bishop Jones at the Liverpool Synod. For those of my readers who are not Anglicans, when a diocese in England or America and I think but am not sure, all the other parts of the Anglican Communion comes together in synod, the Bishop gets the first word. That is, before the business, as presiding officer the bishop makes an address. In many American diocese, this is in the form of the sermon at an opening Morning Prayer liturgy.

The bishop in American diocese traditionally offers a review of the last year, and comments on the business to come. These comments can, they do not always, contain recommendations. Bishop Jones used his address this morning to comment on and recommend a vote against, the Covenant. His entire address is available on line at the diocese of Liverpool web site and it is worth reading. In my view, however, the following is the central, indeed critical point.

The problem with the Covenant is that it introduces a dynamic which makes the Communion essentially introspective and resistant to change. Instead of setting us free to engage with a changing world it freezes us at a given point in our formation, holding us back and making us nervous about going beyond the boundaries and reaching out to God’s world. Indeed, just at the point that the church needs to be innovative and courageous against the forces ranged against us we will find ourselves constrained by fears as to whether our bold actions might mire us in procedures of dispute resolution.

There are any number of reasons to reject the Covenant. Section One's history of the polity is an incredibly bad piece of work that completely and one can only think intentionally ignores the history of the Churches in Scotland and the USA, while badly miss-stating the history of the first woman ordered as an Anglican priest. Sections Two and Three attempt without much success to create a "traditional framework" of the "instruments of unity" and assign to it authority the creators of the Lambeth Council and Anglican Communion never envisioned. Section Four takes this alleged framework and builds an amazingly convoluted scheme of canon law that seeks to make the "instruments" including the Covenant's creation, the "standing committee" into an international over-arching authority. All of that is simply wrong.

But Bishop Jones correctly hits a central point. None of this has to do with what the church needs.

In a time when we need to be experimental, open to electronic media as tools, electronic communities as a new kind of "church," and open to a new level of inclusiveness as we understand people, and the span of global ideas, anew; the Covenant turns its back on innovation, and new thoughts. It is the temple failure of our day, the reaction of the high priests condemning Jesus as he calls for a new viewpoint, writ into our age. We cannot afford the weight of the Covenant holding down our experience of the love of God, nor can we let it hold back our evangelism.

So it is fitting that the covenant failed crucial tests today, the feast of Patrick, Patron of Ireland and Patron of Evangelism. Without the Covenant, we can be evangelists. With it we cannot.

Well done England! I pray next week will formally end the threat of the Covenant in England. Then we need to speak truth to other provinces.

Well, yes actually I do have Irish relatives....

Jim celebrates the St. Patrick's Day votes.

FWIW
jimB

Dr. Williams Resignation

I have been wondering what to write as I contemplate the news that despite various furious denials, the rumors are true and Dr. Williams is leaving the office of ArchBishop of Canterbury, "ABC" as we who think, probably too much, about things Anglican have it.

Even before the news broke, back when all we had were the denials, there has been speculation about a successor. Here is the truth: none of us know a thing. The process by which an ABC is selected makes the election of the Pope look open and transparent. I tried to diagram it once and gave up in defeat.

In the event, the name of the actual new ABC will "emerge" at some point. It is sobering to realize how well the Church in England can do without an incumbent ABC when what the Brits, with more humor that description refer to as, "the appointment process" is churning.

Meanwhile one can only wish Dr. Williams well. He is a good, thoughtful, decent, and brilliant man who was faced with a huge challenge he simply could not master. I hope he has a great time in Cambridge. I truly join many in the Anglican part of the world who wish him well.

FWIW
jimB

Nailed It!

Every nce in a while, someone writes a blog post that precisely . We Americans call that, "nailing it." This post is the definition of that. Short, well said and precise it shreds the so-called "Covenant yes" position. Please take the time to read this it is simply priceless. Simply Massing Priest's Post

FWIW
jimB

We Need A New Award Category (Updated)

Is there no award for the single lamest faux-apology of the year? In the tradition of the Oscars, where one may never admit to campaigning: For Your Consideration Rush Limbaugh

For over 20 years, I have illustrated the absurd with absurdity, three hours a day, five days a week. In this instance, I chose the wrong words in my analogy of the situation. I did not mean a personal attack on Ms. Fluke.

Really? Are we all supposed to be so stupid we buy this? He did not mean a personal attack on a woman he has never met but called a, "slut" and whose sex life (about which like me he knows nothing) he wants video-recorded and broadcast? Really?

He did not unintentionally insult the lady, and he did not make an error. He flat out attacked her. She had not after all testified before Congress, the Republican fools who run that soiled institution had limited testimony about women's sexuality and medical needs to men. She had changed no law, -- written no legislation. She had merely adopted a political opinion other than the Limbaugh position! For that, and nothing else, he labeled her, lampooned her sexuality, and insulted even his listeners intelligence.

Mr. Limbaugh is not of course apologizing to Ms. Fluke. He is reacting as a good capitalist to the unmentioned fact that so far, and weekend meetings are probably ongoing, seven eight advertisers have pulled their ads, while a number of others in "bulk buy" pools are asking their ad air-time suppliers to refocus their pooling activity. In simple terms this idiot insult is looking to cost Mr. Limbaugh money. If some of the stations broadcasting his show begin to reconsider their commitments to syndication, it could cost him a lot of money indeed. Oops!

My son wonders, did Mr. Limbaugh use insurance to obtain the drugs he abused? If if Ms. Fluke is a "slut" is he a "junkie?" Good questions!

So here is the question: what should the rest of us do? I think we need a new award. We can call it the Golden Idiot. We should make him the sole nominee for it. After all, who else could contend? Oh wait, I forgot Senator Santorum. Hm.... Maybe we need something like categories and an awards show?

FWIW
jimB

Lent 2012

I love [and perhaps have over told] the story of a newly ordered priest who notices a man at his early morning mass every day. The man never seems to participate, he sits in the pew focused on the crucifix above the altar. Generally he sits there after the mass ends, as the priest makes way for the next celebrant. After several weeks the priest, consumed with curiosity, finally approaches the man and asks if he can be of any assistance to him? The man politely says no. The priest then says that he has noticed that the man is always there and does not seem to be a participant so what is he doing? The man replies nodding towards the altar, "I look at him and he looks at me."

For mediators, rosary prayers, indeed for any mystic, this story resonates. I look on him and he looks on me. That is the centering experience in a very few words. We do not pray seeking answers, we pray seeking assurance that we can find answers. Once in a great while, we get more than we ask for when we pray.

Lent is a time when many catholic communities offer the stations of the cross (there is an Anglican version as well as the Roman.) And some parishes (not mine alas) offer opportunities to pray rosaries or to learn centering prayer as part of our, "spiritual discipline." If your parish offers an opportunity I hope you consider walking those roads. One paradox of the mystic is that our pathways are so solitary and yet we often choose to share the journey. It is often a good way to begin.

Lent is a time to listen to God, and be sure God listens to us. It is also a time to prepare for Easter and the celebration of Resurrection.

Oremus -- Let us pray.

FWIW
jimB

The UN and Syria

They have healed the wound of my people lightly, saying, ‘Peace, peace,’ when there is no peace.¹

The news this morning is that Kofi Anon is on his way to Syria. He is according to the news, seeking a cease fire and the insertion of Arab League "peacekeepers" under UN authority.

There is just so much wrong with this. The logic that suggests that there can be "peacekeepers" without peace is baffling. "President" Assad, the dictator who "leads" the country can hardly guarantee a ceasefire given the fact that his continuing presence in Syria is the issue causing the rebellion.

The West, or perhaps it is more correct to say the entire world community, has some very bad choices:

• Do nothing. Continue the arms embargo, but otherwise do nothing. This assumes that eventually either the rebellion will fail or succeed. In either case, there is not much that the rest of us can do about it, except offer medical and other aid.
• Intervene as we did in Lybia. Send significant air power into the area and pound Assad's supporters into rubble. This would of course end the conflict, but it is difficult to see how Syria would prosper after such carnage.
• Invade. Send Arab League, Chinese and Russian (if the UN could get them,) and possibly NATO troops into the country, smash Assad's troops and impose something like peace. With Iran so close by, the issues this would raise are immediately obvious.

A variant of the first option involves a half-embargo. That is, embargo ammo for Assad's troops but not the rebels. And this variant comes with another: actually supply ammo to the rebels. This assumes that someone, CIA, MI5 or someone knows who is whom. For reasons utterly unclear to me, this is the bloody option favored by some Republican candidates and "leaders" including Senator McCain. Arming a rebellion that can then resort to "asymmetrical warfare" virtually guarantees long, bloody war.

There is one other option, the one we cannot actually say we are considering. Someone either USA using a drone or Seal team, England's MI-5 or Massad could assassinate Mr. Assad. The problem is that someone would replace him, and that person might actually be competent. Which could make the situation worse. While adding Mr. Assad to the tally of recently dead dictators has its attractions, Iran demonstrates this is not a guarantee of peace.

So, what is the best course? Mrs. Clinton and the other foreign ministers have gathered to consider that question. But they seem to me to have very few if any good answers. It may be that finally after Lybia, Iran, Egypt, Afghanistan, and Somolia, we are at last coming to understand the limits of power. Oh we can indeed bomb Syria into the stone age. But that does not solve the problems, it does not make Syria a prosperous partner in the world community. It does of course let us tell each other we have, "done something." But the problem will then remain.

It may be that we are left with the option that no government wants to proclaim. Wait. Pray, plan for immediate and effective rescue operation as they become possible. Muslims and Christians while waiting for the events to provide an opportunity to intervene with help for those harmed, can pray. I do not suggest that we can expect magic answers, only that we have to bring our issues to God, and await God's time. Oremus - let us pray.

FWIW
jimB








1English Standard Version (©2001)