More Episcopaliana

So I posted the other day about D025, the resolution from the Episcopal General Convention that says, “Yeah, we like being Anglican, but we think gays in committed monogamous relationships (which would be marriage if we, y’know, let them get married) should be eligible to be bishops and priests if they meet the requirements and go through the discernment process.”

Reactions are filtering in.

As BD noted at the time, as has been commented upon elsewhere, the Archbishop of Canterbury (ABC, in Anglican-slang) was not amused, calling it all regretable. He seems not to have read the resolution as a whole (esp. the parts where it says, “We really, truly, ooly, like being part of the Anglican Communion, which is why we title the bill, ‘Commitment and Witness to Anglican Communion’“), and further seems to think that the resolution means TEC is going to be ordaining a veritable army of gay and lesbian priests and bishops, all of them blowing raspberries at Nigeria’s Abp. Akinola.

Interestingly enough, even though the ABC made his uninformed statement prior to the bishops voting on the resolution, or its final confirmation in the House of Deputies (since the bishops wordsmithed it a bit), it stopped neither house from proceeding. It appears they saw his statement less as a considered theological opinion than as part of his increasingly frantic efforts to maintain an already unstable status quo.

Interestingly, some folks don’t see this as a repudiation of 2006’s B033, which called for TEC to use “restraint” in ordaining folks whose “manner of life” (nice phrase) might cause the rest of the Communion heartburn. Whether B033 played a role in no further gays being elected by dioceses as bishops over the last three years is uncertain, but, yes, in theory you can argue that B033’s call for restraint and sensitivity (not an actual moratorium) remains intact, while D025’s basically says that it’s up to God who gets chosen (the latter may be theologically true, but there’s still a very human process at work).

The Times of London’s lead editorial applauds the move. 

It is possible to maintain that the Episcopal Church has been impolitic in its vote, but still maintain that it is right. A united Anglican witness to the nation and to the world is a valuable civic as well as religious resource. Those member Churches, including many in Africa, who conscientiously cannot accept homosexual bishops, should not have appointments forced upon them. But the issue is not one of denominational preference alone. It is also a matter of justice.

Kendall Harmon, a vocal  conservative Episcopal theologian, is not pleased.

The passage of Resolution D025 by the General Convention of 2009 is a repudiation of Holy Scripture as the church has received and understood it ecumenically in the East and West. It is also a clear rejection of the mutual responsibility and interdependence to which we are called as Anglicans. That it is also a snub to the Archbishop of Canterbury this week while General Synod is occurring in York only adds insult to injury.

I don’t recall seeing much “mutual responsibility and interdependence” from various foreign provinces over the past several years, fomenting schism within the Episcopal Church. 

The conservative Anglican Communion Institute is already trying to use the as-yet-unadopted (and now we see why) “Anglican Covenant” as a club to show that those nasssssty Episcopalians ought to be booted from the club.

It is noteworthy that Section 3.1.4 of the final text of the Anglican Communion Covenant, which was contained in the section approved overwhelmingly by the Anglican Consultative Council and no longer subject to revision, gives each of the Communion Instruments the authority to “initiate and commend a process of discernment and a direction for the Communion and its Churches.”  Speaking at the close of the Council’s meeting, the Archbishop of Canterbury anticipated yesterday’s action and spoke directly to The Episcopal Church on its place in the Anglican Covenant when he said “Action to negate that resolution [the moratorium] would instantly suggest to many people in the communion that The Episcopal Church would prefer not to go down the route of closer structural bonds and that particular kind of mutual responsibility.”

Oh, and they support anyone who wants to break from the Episcopal Church, too.

Honestly, though, I don’t see much further drama within TEC in terms of parishes or dioceses trying to leave; those folks have already sailed, and bon voyage to them (as long as they didn’t try to take the family silver as they left).

Other reactions.