An Episcopal diocese formally secedes

Exactly a year ago the Episcopal diocese of San Joaquin approved a preliminary resolution to secede from the Episcopal Church USA, and yesterday the diocese overwhelmingly passed its final vote on the matter. Up to this point many individual parishes have seceded from the Episcopal Church over its ordination of an active homosexual as bishop and, more broadly, over its basic rejection of Christian doctrine, as seen in the statements of its presiding bishop, Katherine Jefferts Schori, but this is the first time an entire diocese has seceded. The San Joaquin diocese also voted to align itself with a foreign Anglican province—not, however, with a province in Africa, as many breakaway parishes have done, but with one in South America. Bishop John Schofield, the head of the diocese, estimates that as many as nine dioceses out of 110 Episcopal dioceses may secede, and that, as the New York Times paraphrases his comments, “together they would ultimately form a new Anglican province of North America, marginalizing the Episcopal Church.”

San Joaquin has always been more conservative. According to the Times:

The Diocese of San Joaquin, with 47 parishes and 8,800 members, has long been different from the rest of the church. It is one of three dioceses that does not ordain women priests. It stopped sending money to the church budget after the consecration of Bishop Robinson. Its cathedral runs a ministry for those struggling “with sexual brokenness,” which includes homosexuality, Bishop Schofield said.

The drive to leave the church began just after Bishop Robinson’s consecration. About three to eight parishes are likely to remain in the church, said the Rev. Van McCalister, spokesman for the diocese, and among them will be Church of the Saviour in Hanford, a small town near Fresno….

The split also threatens to draw in the rest of the Communion and the archbishop of Canterbury, the Most Rev. Rowan Williams, the Communion’s spiritual leader.

Excuse me, but the confused hippie leftist Rowan Williams is not qualified to be the spiritual leader of an ant colony. Indeed, on the basis of the de-divinized version of the Bible that Williams endorsed in 2004, can we say that he is any less of a non-Christian than Katherine Schori?

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Terry Morris writes:

Thanks for the link to the article from 2004. I had not previously seen this version of the Bible. That anyone calling himself “Christian” could accept such a translation, particularly someone in a leadership position within the church, is simply appalling. I personally can barely tolerate reading portions of the New King James Version, but this version is just beyond the pale! It reminds me of the “ethnic” version that came out a few years ago—an overtly anti-Christian version.

A reader writes:

The version of the Bible that Archbishop Williams loves is not “ultra modern.” That implies it is as sleek as the Geffen building at the Mayo Clinic or as up-to-date as the Airbus A380. It is instead, some parody of what hippies would translate the bible forty years ago. It reads very stale and out-of-date.

LA replies:

Just like Williams, who looks like a stale out-of-date hippie with granny glasses! (I forget at the moment if he actually wears such glasses, but that’s my memory of him; I have a funny picture at VFR of him and the Ineffable Frank, but I’m not finding it at the moment. Wait—here it is thanks to Google. They’re not exactly granny glasses, but on him they look like granny glasses.)

Jim P. writes:

As I was logging onto AOL to write you, I came upon this on AOL’s home page. As usual, the media can only frame this event through a liberal lens. Throughout the entire article the only issues at odds are the ordination of women and homosexuals. It is not until the very last paragraph do they quote the seceding authorities as wanting to worship from the prayer book they know and avoid modern conventions that are contrary to the teachings they believe. The comment thread is a revolting back and forth over homosexuality.

Also, it saddens me that the San Joachin diocese chose to align with a South American province when they had to look no further than here.

If you read their homepage and note their explanation of the challenges that face Western Christianity, it reads like many a VFR entry on the subject.

LA replies:

I know that some Episcopalians broke away in the 1970s over women’s ordination. I’ve been to a couple of their services over the years. But I thought they were called “Anglican Catholic” (as distinct from Anglo-Catholic, the traditional high church wing of Anglicanism). I didn’t realize they were still aligned with the Anglican Communion, as a “province,” the Province of Christ the King.

If this is the case, then why do the present seceding Episopalians need to look to Africa and South America for an alternative diocese or Province?

Jim P. replies:

I’m not certain. Let’s say that the Diocese of Christ the King represents a traditionalist view of Christianity. If the San Joachin Diocese really wanted to worship under a traditional prayer book, wouldn’t they have broken away long ago. Instead, it seems that they are only now saying, “enough’s enough”.

LA replies:

Jim P. is correct that the present seceders are coming rather late. They didn’t secede over the ordination of women, didn’t secede over the sterilized 1979 Prayer Book, they didn’t secede over homosexual priests. Only when it reached the point of the ordination of an active and vocal homosexual as a bishop did they finally say it had gone too far.

But I can also understand this. The other changes were bad, but were still arguably within a gray area. The ordination of an active and publicly acknowledged homosexual as a bishop was crossing a line into non-Christianity.

Terry Morris writes:

Jim P. wrote:

“If the San Joachin Diocese really wanted to worship under a traditional prayer book, wouldn’t they ‘have’ broken away long ago. Instead, it seems that they are only now saying, ‘enough’s enough.’”

This is understandable as LA states. One needn’t look any farther than the Declaration of Independence which states: “and accordingly all experience hath shown that mankind is more disposed to suffer while evils are sufferable than to right themselves…” I think this is true of religion as well as politics.

If either of you have ever read the book “Acres of Diamonds,” then you can understand as well the reasoning of the San Joachin diocese searching the world over for an alternative province or Diocese when they needn’t look any further than their own backyard.

Bill Carpenter writes:

Thanks for your article on San Joaquin. Did you read the New Yorker article a year and a half ago on the Robinson controversy? There was a notable contrast between the spiritual stature of Bishop Duncan of Pittsburgh, the faithful and loving Bishop of Pittsburgh, and Bishop Robinson, who seemed weighed down and trapped by his psychological injuries.

Archbishop Williams seems yet another incarnation of the Peter principle.

Karen writes from England:

The Church Of Nigeria (Anglican Communion) and headed by the indomitable Primate Peter Akinola has opened up in the USA and is spreading with more church plants. He has consecrated several bishops without involvement of Rowan Williams and invites Americans to join. The Church sticks to the scriptures and is strongly opposed to homosexuals and other liberal abnormalities. American conservatives have described Akinola’s traditional stance as result of being “under pressure from Muslims in Nigeria.”

Links here, here, and here.

Akinola himself said recently in a Times interview “when the Europeans brought the gospel to Africa it was considered to be an amazing revelation; now that I bring the gospel back to Europe, the Archbishop of Canterbury (Williams) regards me as a nuisance.”

Karen continues:

What is the point of this?

The black archbishop Smetanu, the second highest in the C of E, has said this:

“Dr Sentamu called on Christians to “pray, march and protest” over Zimbabwe as they did over Ian Smith’s white-ruled Rhodesia and apartheid South Africa”

Rhodesia and South Africa were successful countries which gave blacks the highest standards of living in Africa. Africans voted for Mugabe and if permitted to vote again, would probably still vote for him. What’s wrong with blacks that they cannot see this?

Posted by Lawrence Auster at December 09, 2007 08:43 AM | Send