Month: June 2006

Scott Adams, the father of the Dilbert comic strip, has proposed that there is a right way, a wrong way and the weasel way. The Weasel way has been superseded now by the Anglican way. The Archbishop of Canterbury has thrown in the towel on unity within the Anglican Community and proposed splitting the Church into the Orthodox Historical Anglicans who have a vote in Church matters and the liberals who will be under the umbrella of his authority but be given no vote in matters of Church government. Below is an article from the London Telegraph explaining this idea that is sure to make waves.

Williams sets out his blueprint for twin-track Church

By Jonathan Petre, Religion Correspondent
(Filed: 28/06/2006)

The Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr Rowan Williams, yesterday outlined radical plans that could force the liberal American Church out of mainstream Anglicanism if it refuses to toe the majority line on issues such as homosexuality.

In his most personal and direct statement on the crisis engulfing the worldwide Church, the archbishop made clear that his patience was running out with liberals who defy official policy yet want to stay in the Anglican “club”.

In a six-page “reflection”, Dr Williams set out a blueprint for a “two-track” Communion, with Churches prepared to obey official policy classed as “constituent” members and those who refuse to curb their autonomy being given “aossciate” status.

The “associate” Churches would still be bound by historic links but would not share the same constitutional structures, he suggested.

In a phrase that will alarm liberals, the archbishop said the relationship between the constituent and associate members would be like that between the Church of England and Methodist Church.

“The ‘associated’ Churches would have no direct part in the decision-making of the ‘constituent’ Churches, though they might be observers whose views were sought or whose expertise was shared from time to time, and with whom significant areas of co-operation might be possible,” he said.

The move would effectively create two strands of Anglicanism and would be widely seen as the equivalent of a schism even if no individual provinces are formally expelled.

Allies of the archbishop believe that the plan will ensure that Anglicanism will remain a broad but manageable movement, but critics will fear that he would gain papal-style powers over an inner core of Churches.

The archbishop’s letter to the Church did not address the more immediate fate of the American Episcopal Church, which failed to meet the requests made by him and his fellow primates to halt its liberal agenda at its General Convention in Columbus, Ohio, last week.

Dr Williams is not expected to make a final pronouncement on whether the liberal leadership of the American Church will be invited to the 2008 Lambeth Conference until a meeting of all the primates early next year.

But he will hope to persuade conservatives that expelling the Americans will not be necessary, as the liberals could anyway find themselves on the margins.

Under his long-term plan, first disclosed in The Daily Telegraph last month, all provinces will be given the chance to sign a “covenant”, which will restrain them from acting unilaterally on contentious issues.

Those that did not – up to a third have expressed doubts – would be able to continue pushing through their divisive reforms without destroying the rest of the Church. But they would lose their voting rights at key Anglican summits where policy is decided.

A number of provinces, including the American Episcopal Church and the Anglican Church in Canada, have already made clear that they would be highly unlikely to sign such an agreement.

If the plan is adopted at the next Lambeth Conference, the liberals will be confronted with a choice of whether to join up and lose their much- prized autonomy, or face isolation.

In his reflection to all bishops, clergy and Anglican faithful worldwide, Dr Williams said: “There is no way in which the Anglican Communion can remain unchanged by what is happening at the moment.

“Neither the liberal nor the conservative can simply appeal to a historic identity that doesn’t correspond with where we now are.”

Liberals reacted with fury to the plan, describing it as a mess that would please no one.

Affirming Catholicism, a liberal group of which Dr Williams was a founding member, said that “partition” would not work.

 

I was forwarded the following letter from a Reformed Episcopal minister to his ECUSA (Episcopal Church in the United States) counterpart in the same city.

Dear _______,

I watched via the Internet and news broadcasts the General Convention of ECUSA with great interest.  I am very sorry for the results.

Several of the resolutions that passed in Columbus will impair our fellowship.  Specifically, those resolutions calling the Holy Scriptures anti-Jewish, anti-women, and oppressive of people by their race, class gender, and sexuality.  Are they?  If the Scriptures cannot be seen as the rule by which Christians judge their actions, then what is the alternative ethically, theologically, personally?

Then, the failure to heed the Primates and their pastoral call to repentance, and refusing the meet the demands of the Windsor Report.  Isn’t this rebellion?  Why should your parishes listen to you or your Presiding Bishop?  Doesn’t this make ECUSA little more than well-dressed Baptists, or worse?

But most importantly, ECUSA’s rejection of Jesus Christ in His unique and exclusive claims of salvation (Acts 4:12?).  And, refusing to affirm His substitutionary atonement on the cross for us. (Isa. 53?)  And, refusing to affirm the responsibility of the Church to evangelize in Jesus’ name.  It seems that ECUSA was seeking it’s own Mars Hill, and it’s own altar to the Unknown God, unlike St. Paul.

While I would enjoy discussing General Convention with you, your church has taken a position like Peter by the fire, prior the crucifixion; of denial of the Christ.  Such good could have come from our Christian fellowship.  I am, as I said at the beginning, sorry.  For now, following the Primates in repentance seems the wisest course.

Your friend and brother,

________

In the early 1980’s, Steve Taylor blew the doors off the Christian music world with his six-song album I Want to Be a Clone. One of the tracks on this release was Whatever Happened to Sin?

I heard the reverend say
“gay is probably normal in the Good Lord’s sight
what’s to be debated? Jesus never stated what’s right”
I’m no theology nut, but the reverend may be a little confused
for if the Lord don’t care and he chooses to ignore-ah
tell it to the people of Sodom and Gomorrah
Call it just an alternate lifestyle, huh? morality lies within
consciences are restin’ please repeat the question again

whatever happened to sin?

I often hearken back to the lyrics of this song when I witness the hypocrisy and heresy that were on display this last weekend by the both the Episcopal and the Presbyterian Churches.

Each group in their own way extended their middle finger to God, Holy Scripture, Orthodox Christianity and many of their parishioners. Each group, if they hadn’t already, formally broke with being identified as “Christian”.

Newly elected leader of the U.S. Episcopal Church Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori said on Monday she believed homosexuality was no sin and homosexuals were created by God to love people of the same gender. 

By embracing homosexuality and female clergy Americas largest Episcopal group has denied both the nature of sin and the Authority of Holy Scripture. In effect the Episcopal Church has rejected any pretense of being “Christian”. They are now just another heretical sect. They follow their own lusts and have followed after other gods made in their own image. They are modern Samaritans.

The Anglican Communion is now left with no choice but to turn the ECUSA group over to Satan in hope that God’s judgment will lead to repentance.

The Presbyterian Church has chosen a similar fate. They have decided to give the doctrine of the Trinity a politically correct makeover that formally makes them a heretical group that is no longer “Christian”.

The divine Trinity _ “Father, Son and Holy Spirit” _ could also be known as “Mother, Child and Womb” or “Rock, Redeemer, Friend” at some Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) services under an action Monday by the church’s national assembly.

Besides “Mother, Child and Womb” and “Rock, Redeemer, Friend,” proposed Trinity options drawn from biblical material include:
_ “Lover, Beloved, Love”
_ “Creator, Savior, Sanctifier”
_ “King of Glory, Prince of Peace, Spirit of Love.”

Lest you think I am being too harsh, you are welcome to read the Athanasian Creed, which appears below in its entirety. Along with the Apostles and Nicene Creeds, these Creeds comprise the backbone of Christianity. To reject these Creeds is to reject Christianity.

The Athanasian Creed

Whoever wishes to be saved must, above all else, hold to the true Christian Faith. Whoever does not keep this faith pure in all points will certainly perish forever.

Now this is the true Christian faith: We worship one God in three persons and three persons in one God, without mixing the persons or dividing the divine being. For each person—the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit—is distinct, but the deity of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit is one, equal in glory and coeternal in majesty. What the Father is, so is the Son, and so is the Holy Spirit.

The Father is uncreated, the Son uncreated, and the Holy Spirit uncreated; The Father is eternal, the Son eternal, and the Holy Spirit eternal. And yet they are not three who are eternal, but there is one who is eternal, just as they are not three who are uncreated, nor three who are infinite, but there is one who is uncreated and one who is infinite.

In the same way the Father is almighty, the Son is almighty, and the Holy Spirit is almighty. And yet they are not three who are almighty, but there is one who is almighty. So the Father is God, the Son is God, the Holy Spirit is God. And yet they are not three Gods, but one God. So the Father is Lord, the Son is Lord, the Holy Spirit is Lord; yet they are not three Lords, but one Lord.

For just as Christian truth compels us to confess each person individually to be God and Lord, so the true Christian faith forbids us to speak of three Gods or three Lords. The Father is neither made not created, nor begotten of anyone. The Son is neither made nor created, but is begotten of the Father alone. The Holy Spirit is neither made nor created nor begotten, but proceeds from the Father and the Son. So there is one Father, not three Fathers; one Son, not three Sons; one Holy Spirit, not three Holy Spirits.

And within this Trinity none comes before or after; none is greater or inferior, but all three persons are coequal and coeternal, so that in every way, as stated before, all three persons are to be worshiped as one God and one God worshiped as three persons. Whoever wishes to be saved must have this conviction of the Trinity.

It is furthermore necessary for eternal salvation truly to believe that our Lord Jesus Christ also took on human flesh. Now this is the true Christian faith: We believe and confess, that our Lord Jesus Christ, God’s Son, is both God and Man. He is God, eternally begotten from the nature of the Father, and he is man, born in time from the nature of his mother, fully God, fully man, with rational soul and human flesh, equal to the Father, as to his deity, less than the Father, as to his humanity; and though he is both God and Man, Christ is not two persons but one, one, not by changing the deity into flesh, but by taking the humanity into God; one, indeed, not by mixture of the natures, but by unity in one person.

For just as the reasonable soul and flesh are one human being, so God and man are one Christ, who suffered for our salvation, descended into hell, rose the third day from the dead. He ascended into heaven, is seated at the right hand of God the Father almighty, and from there he will come to judge the living and the dead. At his coming all people will rise again with their own bodies to answer for their personal deeds. Those who have done good will enter eternal life, but those who have done evil will go into everlasting fire.

This is the true Christian Faith. Whoever does not faithfully and firmly believe this cannot be saved.