That's My Church!

The Maximum Leader flags a WaPo piece in which High Priestess Katharine Jefforts-Schori serves up the ECUSA's message of Inclusion Uber Alles and nails the pertinent question in response:

You know something... Bishopress Schori's statement is filled with references to good deed and helping the poor and downtrodden. There is fleeting reference to "widely varying theological opinions" and that is the point to which your Maximum Leader would like to ask a question. Is it important that a church have some sort of core beliefs? Perhaps the core beliefs of the Episcopal Church are helping the poor and downtrodden. That is fine. It would also put the Episcopal Church in the same grouping as the Kiwanis and Rotary Clubs. (Your Maximum Leader almost typed in the Salvation Army, but the Salvation Army is a strongly Christian organization.) But at what point do some of those "widely varying theological opinions" need to be made a little less "widely varying?"

Indeed, he's hit the proverbial nail on the head. Conservatives within the Episcopal Church will tell you that it has been drifting away from any kind of theological coherence in favor of designer piety and an all-embracing social activism for years. And if you read the writings of, say Bishop Spong or Marcus Borg, you'll see the truth of this claim. Indeed, I believe that some of the more progressive elements of the Church have even embraced wiccan and pagan worship and/or ritual in their quest for inclusiveness. And, although it's not widely reported, a motion declaring the Bible as the ultimate source of spiritual authority never even made it out of committee at the 2006 General Convention.

However, I believe the Church is shortly to be called to account, because the issue of core beliefs is exactly the question being threshed out under the rubric of the Windsor Process, the Anglican Communion's response to the ECUSA's 2004 General Convention.

One of the pieces of that process is the development of an Anglican Covenant, the purpose of which is "to give explicit articulation and recognition to the principles of co-operation and interdependence (sometimes called “the bonds of affection”) which hold the Anglican Communion together." A good bit of this focuses on the interrelationship of the various members of the Communion, but it is my understanding that the Covenant will be based on a very explicit set of core principles, some of which the ECUSA no longer follows.

In my opinion, these are the real metrics to watch (as opposed to the current rebellion within the ECUSA) because each member of the Communion, perhaps at the next Lambeth Conference in 2008, is going to be asked the simple question: Will you adhere to the Covenant or will you not? Those that cannot commit will no longer be full members of the Communion, although it's possible according to one idea floated by the Archbishop of Canterbury that they could hold some kind of "associate" membership. "Anglican In Name Only," as it were.

I think that's when the Communion wafer will hit the fan as far as the ECUSA goes because I simply cannot see Her Priestesshood submitting to such a Covenant. She might try some kind of prevarication akin to the non-apology apology served up by the ECUSA in response to the 2004 Windsor Report, but I've an idea that most of the rest of the Communion wouldn't buy that for an instant.

In any event, if the ECUSA is chucked from the Communion altogether or else reduced to some kind of associate membership, the split within the Church, currently a trickle, will turn into a torrent: those who embrace Kiwanis Episcopalianism, as the Maximum Leader calls it, will go one way and those looking for spiritual cohesion the other. And perhaps that's the best thing after all. But that is why I've started beating the educational drum now - I believe it to be my responsibility to see that each member of my parish is as well-informed as possible when he or she eventually is called upon to make that choice.

UPDATE: Oh, and by the way, I just wanted to extend a huge thank you to everybody who's written comments and sent emails in response to these posts (and to apologize to anybody who's getting tired of my ranting). Your kind words and prayers are deeply appreciated.

Also, I've made plain that I want to gather as much information and insight as possible, so I strongly encourage anyone with something to say to go ahead and drop it in the Tasty Bits Mail Sack (TM).

Yip! Yip!

UPDATE DEUX: Wow. It looks like I've been tossed into a serious Anglican link dump.