 |
| Bishop Mark Lawrence |
Like a lot of people in the Anglican Communion I have come to realise that Katherine Jefferts Schori, the leading light currently in the Episcopal Church of the USA, is a rather unpleasant woman. Strong words, I know, but being pleasant means giving a sense of happy satisfaction or enjoyment. She does the opposite. I would not mind if she promoted her views with Christian charity and a degree of humility. But she seems incapable of doing so. Her secular agenda is the new gospel and this must at all costs supplant orthodox belief.
It is well known that she is bankrupting the church with lawsuits aimed at throwing traditional priests out of their parishes. Money is like confetti to her. Her new doctrines are not even a straight secularising of the sacraments. She has odd notions about Christ's divinity and the faith of the creeds is something for putting in a museum alongside fossils. But it is her latest outrageous comments that put her beyond the pale.
PB Jefferts Schori went to Charleston recently
to inaugurate a new remnant Episcopal diocese. She had fallen out with local bishop Mark Lawrence. In her speech,
she accused Bishop Lawrence (but did not mention him by name) of being a
petty dictator and a wolf masquerading among the sheep. Is this the sort of language
any Christian should utter? No it is not and especially from one purporting to lead.
She said, "I tell
you that story because it's indicative of attitudes we've seen here and
in many other places. Somebody decides he knows the law, and oversteps
whatever authority he may have to dictate the fate of others who may in
fact be obeying the law, and often a law for which this local tyrant is
not the judge. It's not too far from that kind of attitude to citizens'
militias deciding to patrol their towns or the Mexican border for
unwelcome visitors. It's not terribly far from the state of mind
evidenced in school shootings, or in those who want to arm school
children, or the terrorism that takes oil workers hostage."
Think
about that. She is saying that the godly Bishop of South Carolina Mark
Lawrence is a "local tyrant" and his state of mind is like the "school
shooter", Adam Lanza who walked into an elementary school and
slaughtered some 23 children in Connecticut.
The Church of England cannot look across the water and say "it is nothing to do with us" because Schori has her supporters here too. They will use and abuse the system to grind down the faithfull until their secular agenda is fully stamped on the church. The "programme" is led by David Cameron, who displays flashes of arrogance when crossed or quizzed on it. Already such errant priests as Giles Fraser are plotting to defy the law. With regard to
homosexual unions, he says “I certainly wouldn’t do it covertly but if
someone asks me I will phone someone up who has done these services and say
‘how much can I get away with?’. There are a lot of my friends who seem to get away with quite a bit in this.” From his own lips he is known. Is "getting away with it" the kind of talk parishioners should hear?
This secularising of the church is as if a giant cuckoo has emerged in the nest of the Christian Faith. Just plucking its feathers won't do much good. The cuckoo should find a nest of its own!
.jpg)
