Statement from the Primate of the Traditional Anglican Communion
On the latest departures from the Episcopal Church
Our hearts and our prayers are with the former members of the Episcopal Church - from Virginia and other places - as they begin to "walk apart".
We understand their experience that is at once painful and joyful. Joyful, because there can only be joy for those who walk in His ways. Painful, because being forced by the power of conscience to follow the way of Jesus and separate themselves from a church that has chosen the way of sinfulness, involves the risk of leaving family and history and much-loved places. It involves leaving good people who are still confused and not yet driven by their consciences to this point. It involves, above all, leaving in the knowledge that others have done the wrong, and we are paying the price. In the Crucified Christ, we gaze at the one who has already paid the price, and he was without fault.
Our feelings for those now walking apart are intense, because we began walking this way thirty years ago, and it has been a long time in the wilderness. For Anglicans in the Catholic tradition ( who until then were in beautiful balance with Anglicans of the Evangelical tradition , producing an Anglicanism that was a true Communion, with a dynamism that took the F aith to the furthest corners of the world), the point at which conscience broke was the ordination of women to the Priesthood. Catholic Order could not be stretched that far, for we could not be party to Sacramental and Eucharistic schism against the pleading of those who led the Catholic and Orthodox churches of East and West.
We grieved then, and still grieve, that our fellow Anglicans little understood the cause of our reluctant decision to walk apart, and that in many places they embraced this first wave of Anglican gender revolution with enthusiasm. We understood that we were following the demands of the Gospel and the practice of the undivided Church (to which all Anglicans once appealed) in upholding the great doctrines of Creation, Incarnation and Redemption, each of which is challenged by the ordination of women.
Separation in the Church can never be justified by the sinfulness of a minister, even a chief minister. Each of us sins and cries out for redemption. We have in our turn struggled to understand those who seem to be now separating because of the unworthiness of fallen human nature to be immersed in the work of God. But we recognise that we are now dealing with much more than sinful ministers. In the Episcopal Church, and elsewhere in the Anglican world, those very same doctrines, of the Father in Creation and the Son of God in Redemption, are denied by those who deny the power of God's will in human creation, and the even greater power of God's will in the incarnation, death and resurrection of Jesus, his Son. "Mother Jesus" and "Gay marriage" offend the mind of God with just the same intensity as "gender is irrelevant" offends His creating Spirit. The ancient Church, and Jesus himself, would have us walk apart from those who teach evil about God and Salvation. We have noted with joy the steadfast leadership of the Province of Nigeria, the Diocese of Sydney, and the Anglican Mission in America, in upholding as biblical the discipline of East and West on ordination, as well as the related biblical discipline of gender relationships in marriage and morality.
There is now a great company of those who walk apart but who continue to cherish their identity as Anglican Christians. In the impoverished townships of Africa, in the persecuted Anglican communities of India and Pakistan, in the prophetic fragments of Christianity in Asia, in Australia and the Pacific nations, and throughout the American continent, there are now thousands of Anglican communities that have heard the Gospel imperative to "walk apart". That they do not walk together surprises none of us - people do not walk together after they have suffered devastation. They must be gathered by shepherds who know and love their sheep. That is our next challenge. May God give us strength, especially to those just joining the walking. May He make the rough places smooth for them, and every mountain and hill in their pathway be made low.
+John Hepworth, Primate
Thousands flee Episcopal Church, Break-up of Canterbury's Communion under way
IT is reported that over 40,000 faithful Episcopalians left The Episcopal Church (TEC) in 2006, and an estimated 115,000 in the past two years. They didn't just change congregations, but left it altogether. December 2006 saw the greatest single exodus of Episcopalians in the 300-year history of the Diocese of Virginia. More than 20% of the funding and 25% of its members have either left or will leave that diocese this year.
As we move into 2007 there is the possibility of one or more dioceses leaving The Episcopal Church. The Episcopal Bishop of San Joaquin John-David Schofield has written a letter to his diocese saying his diocese could secede from the TEC.
The Episcopal Church is led by a female "bishop" Mrs Katherine Jefferts Schori, an ultra-liberal from Nevada, elected the [Canterbury-led] Anglican Communion's first female Primate in late 2006.
This historic but divisive development is now seeing a break-up of the worldwide Anglican denomination.
Within weeks of Mrs Schori's nomination, she found herself at the centre of controversy with an unacceptable rating with most of the Communion's archbishops because of her ultra-liberal views on theology and morality.
Mrs Schori is the first Primate ever, to refer to Jesus as "mother Jesus" during a homily at the 75th General Convention Eucharist beginning an alienation from orthodox Anglican believers that has got worse with time.
In his letter Bishop Schofield said the actions of his diocese should be determined by the fact that The Episcopal Church (TEC) (1) denies the unique divinity of Jesus Christ and (2) takes a position on human sexuality which undercuts marriage and is destructive to the family unit designed by God and revealed in Scripture. These are not positions and teachings which are merely "revisionist" or "liberal." These are positions of those who have abandoned the Christian faith, he wrote.
Mrs. Katharine Jefferts Schori is expected to attend the Anglican Primates meeting in Tanzania in February.
Source includes VirtueOnline
