Michael, that is the kind of answer my daughter gives when we call her on some defect in her behavior: “But what about [my brother]?” I have also read the warnings of the ABC to the Diocese of New Westminster, so I would say that your statements here are not entirely accurate anyway. But when you’re reduced to pointing to the failure to discipline someone else, you’ve tacitly admitted that you are sinning. I refuse to accept that the moral logic of squabbling and disobedient teenagers is the standard of conduct in this.

Charles Wingate - 15 July 2009 02:15 PM

Michael, that is the kind of answer my daughter gives when we call her on some defect in her behavior: “But what about [my brother]?” I have also read the warnings of the ABC to the Diocese of New Westminster, so I would say that your statements here are not entirely accurate anyway. But when you’re reduced to pointing to the failure to discipline someone else, you’ve tacitly admitted that you are sinning. I refuse to accept that the moral logic of squabbling and disobedient teenagers is the standard of conduct in this.

Gosh, was that mentioned to the founders when they included equal protection as part of our founding rights?  The reality is that we have been vilified and whupped on for something we have not done, public rites for same sex blessings.  That is the moratorium, not the actions of some bishops allowing a pastoral response in their dioceses. So in fact we still have not done it, yet get disproportionately blamed for it. 

The credibility of an authority resides with its capacity to dispense justice equitably. Of we have no authority so enfranchised so all of this is nonsense.

The reality is that we have been vilified and whupped on for something we have not done, public rites for same sex blessings.  That is the moratorium, not the actions of some bishops allowing a pastoral response in their dioceses. So in fact we still have not done it, yet get disproportionately blamed for it.

Yes, and the Global South Provinces have only done “pastoral responses” in North America, not any border crossings.  Sure…..call it whatever you like Michael, but same-sex blessings have been happening openly and publicly throughout TEC and the ACoC with the full authorization of the diocesan bishops.  Do you realize how juvenile this line of argument is?  “Moooommmmm, you only said I wasn’t supposed to hit Sally.  Well I didn’t, I kicked her.”

Eph. 4:1   I therefore, the prisoner in the Lord, beg you to lead a life worthy of the calling to which you have been called,  2 with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love,  3 making every effort to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.

Ian you said,

What’s most annoying to me I guess is that this issue is being treated almost to the level of a debate on an issue of dogma when it clearly is not.

ISTM that the question of what is a communion breaking issue is decided by the communion, not by the innovative partner.  Letting TEC declare that their new actions are not communion breaking is like a husband being able to declare that his constant visiting of strip clubs is not anything the wife needs to get worked up about.  The Communion (through its primates, bishops, the ABC and the ACC) have all asked us not to do this, but we still keep doing it.  When will we begin the “listening process” where we listen to the rest of the communion and not just say “yes dear” and then continue to do what we want anyway?

YBIC,
Phil Snyder

The Church of Canada has moved further along the path to SSBs than TEC, where is the condemnation of them?  There is no equal treatment in this process.  But in the end I am happy for TEC to be clear and direct and take whatever lumps come along. It can be costly to lead and to enact one’s conscience, but faithful people do it none the less.

Personally, with extraordinary regret, I believe TEC should go it alone and lead according to its liberal conscience. Then it would be possible for the more conservative among us to to have a solid communion with our Anglican brothers.

However having said that, I would prefer the liberals to be happy with simply blessing same sex commitments without using words from the sacrament of marriage. This would give us time to reflect on under age same sex unions, teen age instruction, divorce, consummation, inheritance, civil law, etc. I stand with the Archbishop in defining marriage as a relationship potentially creating offspring. To argue as the liberals do that a strict interpretation of marriage means that once a married woman has had a hysterectomy she is divorced or the marriage annulled is to my mind false. Offspring only occur as a result of some sort of intercourse between a man and a woman. This includes things such as artificial insemination. The fundamental fact for me is ‘a man and a woman’.

Apart from the Bishops, most of the people I met at the General Convention, deputies, priests, deacons, wardens etc appeared to favor including same sex unions in the Sacrament of Marriage: not just that. they were passionate and argumentative about it. As they informed me, “we will win eventually”. Nothing from scripture, nothing about self control, nothing about Jesus Christ suffering on the Cross. Just “we will win eventually”.

A little harsh there Michael! they are experiencing a prophetic moment, “the Holy Spirit is doing a new thing!” lol

Michael Russell - 15 July 2009 05:09 PM

Charles Wingate - 15 July 2009 02:15 PM

Michael, that is the kind of answer my daughter gives when we call her on some defect in her behavior: “But what about [my brother]?” I have also read the warnings of the ABC to the Diocese of New Westminster, so I would say that your statements here are not entirely accurate anyway. But when you’re reduced to pointing to the failure to discipline someone else, you’ve tacitly admitted that you are sinning. I refuse to accept that the moral logic of squabbling and disobedient teenagers is the standard of conduct in this.

Gosh, was that mentioned to the founders when they included equal protection as part of our founding rights?  The reality is that we have been vilified and whupped on for something we have not done, public rites for same sex blessings.  That is the moratorium, not the actions of some bishops allowing a pastoral response in their dioceses. So in fact we still have not done it, yet get disproportionately blamed for it. 

The credibility of an authority resides with its capacity to dispense justice equitably. Of we have no authority so enfranchised so all of this is nonsense.

Michael,
For clarity, how do you define “public rite”? What is the difference between a public rite and a pastoral response?
Karen

Michael Russell - 15 July 2009 05:09 PM

Gosh, was that mentioned to the founders when they included equal protection as part of our founding rights?

That sort of hyperbole is yet another tactic my exceedingly smart daughter uses. In my house, she uses this in an attempt to make “justice delayed is justice denied” work to her advantage, by preventing her parents from ever getting to executing the justice upon her for her misdeeds that she has, in our judgment, earned. Like many teens, she has a lawyerly eye for anything that may divert the parent wrath in some other direction than herself, especially those that involve dumping her wrath upon her parents at the same time. Perhaps you should go to YouTube and type in “Katie Kaboom” for a slightly caricatured sample.

The reality is that we have been vilified and whupped on for something we have not done, public rites for same sex blessings.  That is the moratorium, not the actions of some bishops allowing a pastoral response in their dioceses. So in fact we still have not done it, yet get disproportionately blamed for it.

Michael, I do not agree. Whoever “you” is, the “vilifiers” are mostly condemning that “you” intend to do such unions at all, whether immediately or eventually. They aren’t particularly interested in the public vs. private aspect, and it seems to me that the current environment where there do seem to be dioceses in which such unions can be carried out if done discreetly, besides introducing its own element of hypocrisy, is perhaps not enough different from doing them openly as to matter.

The credibility of an authority resides with its capacity to dispense justice equitably.

Insofar as ECUSA’s authorities dispense justice, they chase after the schismatics while letting the liberal loose cannons roam free. (Sorry for the mixed metaphor—I don’t have time at the moment to come up with something better.) You may think the former is acceptable, but it doesn’t mitigate the latter in any case. GC is cranking out the vacuously nuanced stuff it turns to when it lacks to nerve to deal with issues, and who can say whether some bishop will take the vagueness as authorization to put forth the rites that the sense of the houses shows they eventually want to do, whether next GC or the one after that?