Well. I wonder what on earth that little group is going to talk about. I mean Will +Iker even acknowledge the presence of one of those subhuman women clergy in the same room with him? Both he and +Duncan have made their positions perfectly clear. This is a stupid waste of time dressed up as a "dialog." When are we going to learn that these little sessions aren’t worth it? This will allow +Cantuar to say he tried to lead, but doesn’t require him to actually do so.

Well, this should certainly be interesting. One can't say that the spectrum is not represented.

Can the Archbishop mandate such a meeting? No; and he's said so elsewhere. Can he request such a meeting? Yes; and we're wise to cooperate, rather than to get our backs up. And what of the participation of Canon Kearon? As Secretary General of the Anglican Communion and of the Anglican Consultative Council, this suggests a broader perspective than two English bishops going to Texas, however qualified and however "blessed" by the Archbishop himself. So, not only is the "Focus of Unity" represented, but also one of (and the most representative of) the Instruments of Communion is represented - one that has explicitly not excluded the Episcopal Church.

Now, will Jack Iker sit down with Katharine Jefferts Schori? Will the Moderator of the Network sit down with the Presiding Bishop or Presiding Bishop-elect? It's one thing to do so in the context of the full House of Bishops, and another across a small conference table. (I've had similar questions about North Americans and Africans at the next Lambeth. Will this be prologue?)

I look forward to seeing this. I hope it will result in some clarity that many have been calling for. I personally hope that this will provide a statement that the Archbishop and the ACC will continue to see the Episcopal Church as the recognized Anglican institution in communion with Canterbury and the ACC.

Does Rowan Williams wake up every day and ask: "How can I create chaos in the Anglican Communion today?" Because he's done it...again. What can possibly be the purpose of this meeting? We all know where Duncan and Iker stand. Is Iker going to sit on the other side of the room and direct comments to Jefferts-Schori through a third-party since he doesn't recognize her as either a priest or bishop? Will Duncan sneak out to call Akinola on his cell phone for directions?

Why does Williams continue to meddle in the Episcopal Church, but ignore the nonsense going on by Akinola in Nigeria? Why no intervention there?

Williams could put an end to this whole mess right here and now by saying that all properly consecrated bishops are invited to Lambeth 2008. After that, everyone has to decide whether or not they will accept the invitation.

Oh, and what does this latest development do to Wimberly's gathering of the likeminded next month?

Rowan Williams may be a great theologian, but he's turning out to be a lousy leader. Lead, follow, or get out of the way!

Well, at least this sounds far more "official", than that group meeting at Camp Allen...

I pray the Holy Spirit enlightens all gathered there.

Why not invite Bishop V.G. Robinson too and really "talk turkey" with these scheming, behind-the-scenes, underminding Episcopal Church/Anglican Communion renigades OPENLY?

Let's have it on videotape!

Are they brave enough even with +++Rowan request/encouragement to finally look at the REAL "reasons" for their prejudice/hate in the face-to-face meeting? No more packing up and running out of the room when +V.G.Robinson or ++Jefferts-Schori is about to speak (as Iker did at the GC2006).

Let's see who has enough basic maturity, integrity and personal accountability to sit together once again and pray for healthy outcomes for the Episcopal Church and the Anglican Communion.

Will they try and share Eucharist?

Let's see - not if the PB presides, because his hands touched +Gene.

Not if the PB-Elect presides, because she has female hands.

Not if Bp Lee presides, because although he did not lay hands on +Gene, he voted for him.

Funnily enough, all three of the above would be perfectly happy for any of the others to preside.

The lineup hardly seems to a balanced representation -- is the purpose to have the elected leaders of the church be scolded by the dissidents (with Lee unsure of where he stands)? Balance would seem to require some progressive representation (& please bear in mind that +(+) Katharine was NOT the most progressive candidate on the slate -- nor was ++Frank in 1998).

And it certainly is disappointing that the AC Office has not troubled to spell the PB-elect's name correctly.

I get a little frustrated by some here, who I assume are members of TEC, protesting at the Rowan Williams sticking his nose in to their affairs. Might I suggest that your protest should be aimed at your own Primate?
Was it not he that signed the first Primates Statement protesting the ordination of Gene Robinson, and later the Dromantine Communiqué?
Has he not been party to all these developments and lent his considerable weight to the belief that this (hitherto) “boys club” has some overarching or enhanced responsibility for or governance of the member churches of the Anglican Communion?
Was it not his policy to accede to the requests to withdraw from the ACC and as a result see the Primates mount an attempt to take it over?
I remind my Primate of the errors of his ways on these issues and the fact he signed off on the Windsor Report, at every possible occasion – I make sure in every public and private forum he is reminded that he had no authority for these calamities and I am making every effort to secure support in my Province so that funding for these Primates jaunts comes to an end.
As to this new meeting – the advantage of this one appears to be that it does NOT include the usual suspects from England – it all seems to suggest that something else was ABOUT to happen and that Rowan Williams is trying to wrest back the initiative or (as some might say) muddy the waters!

This is the first positive news I've read in weeks.

The only consoling comment I can think of at this time is that this was inevitable. There is no way the intolerant could allow the liberals to keep making progress without making a stand at some point. Again, the issue will be whether the intolerant will allow diversity: or will they continue to raid, sabotage and/or slander every liberal church that tries to get itself established.

For me, the bigger issue is that there are souls out there who want to have a closer relationship with God through Jesus, but who refuse to turn their backs on their friends and kin and/or refuse to embrace hateful teachings so that their souls can be "saved".

Souls who love unconditionally also need to have access to communion with God. After all, some of the history's worst sinners have gone on to be saints, and the journey to recovery can take years for some. They need their hands held as they recover, not bludgeoned for being imperfect, and for someone who is recovery from being a violent criminal, one of the worst thing you could do is put them in a church structure that advocates punishment of sinners.

If the ultrapuritans can not allow liberal churches to operate without sabotaging them - then who are they to complain when non-Christian countries restrict or attack Christian activities within their nations? They are only doing to the ultra-puritans what the ultra-puritans are doing to the liberals.

I think it's remarkable that these folks are willing to actually sit at the same table with one another in a forum like this. I wonder if any ground rules have been suggested by the ABC or agreed upon by those gathering. If the quote (above) from Bp Iker was accurate, it sounds to me like he's coming in with a predetermined agenda with the intent of monopolizing their time and so, like their tactics regarding GenCon/WR, leaving no possibility for the outcome to be anything but a failure.

I do not have high hopes for this meeting. It is obviously an attempt at mediation connected with consideration of the petitions from +Duncan, +Iker, et. al. for alternative primatial oversight. From +Duncan’s statements, I doubt that he would agree to any arrangment that did not include a commitment to work towards the establishment of a non-geographical, ideologically-based province within TEC with which any TEC congregation could affiliate. I don’t think that any such arrangment will, or should, be acceptable to the larger TEC. The whole matter of APO will land back in Lambeth Palace.

“I think it is significant that I have heard nothing from either the Presiding Bishop or Katharine Jefferts Schori since General Convention."

Why should he have heard from them? Is he supposed to be catered to because gencon did not make decisions pleasing to him? It made some not pleasing to progressives, but I don't see them whining about not having their hands held.

It looks to me again like the ABC wringing his hands and trying to appease a pack of bullies. It doesn't work on the playground and it won't work with purple shirts and pointy hats, either.

Prediction:
Meeting[s] will be held, and participants will agree not to issue statements to the press during he process, but either:
a. 'sources close to the meeting' will leak as on other occasions, or
b. someone will stomp out in a huff and issue a statement that begins, N., Bishop of X, to the churches ...

Prediction:
Nothing short of some kind of total renunciation of the actions of gebcon 03 and much of 06 will suit, and we will be exactly where we are now.

Greetings from the "inclusive and loving" Province of Central America on a gorgeous "eternal Spring" morning!

Bishop Iker has already published that the "two Bishops Meetings" will come together as "one mind" and that Wimberly is invited to the New York Meeting also. Scroll down at this "link" and read the two "posts" by Iker...these "meetings" are more "defined" than we've been told unless Iker is simply continuing to think/do things "his way or the highway!"

http://www.standfirminfaith.com/index.php/site/article/1052/

Bishop Salmon is NOT retired. He is serving as acting bishop of South Carolina with the Standing Committee as the canonical authority. Bishop Salmon hopes to retire next year after the transition to new episcopal leadership is helpfully established.

It seems to me that, like it or not, any kind of Alternative Primatial Oversight will have to involve change or adaptation in the legal structures of the Episcopal Church -- whether that means the creation of a new non-geographical Province X, a "flying bishops" scheme, or some other mechanism. I know similar ideas have been tabled and rejected in the past; but that does not mean that they cannot be reconsidered -- as we saw at General Convention, reconsideration might be considered an Anglican conceptual art-form. (Along with improvisation, another art-form it seems Anglicans have been taking up of late.)

Any official changes will require the official participation of the acknowledged authorities: and whether the dissidents like it or not, the Presiding Bishop is the Presiding Bishop, the General Convention is the General Convention, and it is high time for the Archbishop to work to engage the dissidents with the legal authorities whose consent will be required for any legitimate (i.e., licit) adaptations to accommodate dissent.

So I am hopeful that this meeting (unlike the Texas gathering, for which the Archbishop's approval while claimed has not been explicitly confirmed by his office) may produce some positive and concrete results, because the people capable of actually accomplishing same are to be participants.

"like it or not, any kind of Alternative Primatial Oversight will have to involve change or adaptation in the legal structures of the Episcopal Church"
This should be easy - after all General Convention has abandoned its "prophetic" position leaving its lesbian and gay clergy vulnerable, Gene Robinson in particular.

Let's hope and pray that we are finally seeing some acceptance that the "issues" really are too great to ignore; or to pretend that they are just secondary issues, and that people should "just get over it".

I've really enjoyed debating this with folk here over the last few years, and developed quite a soft spot for many people who I disagree strongly with. But have to sign off for the time being :-( ..... I will be praying.

"The grace of the Lord be with you all".

Dave.

“I think it is significant that I have heard nothing from either the Presiding Bishop or Katharine Jefferts Schori since General Convention."

What's significant, is that +Iker can't even be bothered to refer to the Presiding Bishop-Elect by her proper title. :-(

I continue to pray for a miracle...

"The grace of the Lord be with you all".

Dave.

...and with you too Dave. Amen

With all due respect, Tobias, I don't see how any form of APO can function "in the legal structures of the Episcopal Church," however changed or adapted. The level of oversight that Network congregations have requested in alternative episcopal oversight has been essentially disassociation - independence of the official diocese on financial support, program support, and deployment and ordination. Any "10th province" that had that level of "oversight" - independence of General Convention, of support for the national church, of canons and other standards for ordination, of communion with provinces within the Communion - would functionally be an extension of another Communion province. Whether that were someone we're fond of - Canterbury, say - or someone we're not - Nigeria or Uganda - it would still not be a part of the Episcopal Church in any functional sense. These are still requests of ecclesiastical disassociation, even if some legal nicety pretends there is no disassociation of real property.

If the Archbishop is true to earlier statements on his own authority, and if Kearon is true to his earlier statements about the independence and inclusiveness of the ACC, all that can come from this is a statement that the Archbishop does not have the jurisdiction to resolve this, period; that he will not interfere to any party's benefit and he won't condone any other primate's interference; and that the conservatives need to hear loud and clear the expectation that this will be resolved through negotiation in the United States, because until that effort is exhausted - real effort, and not complaint that there's nothing to talk about - nothing can go the Panel of Reference; and there's no promise something can to the Panel even when the efforts are exhausted.

Why have such broad representation of the "disassociationists?" So that they will all hear the same thing at the same time. It won't prevent spin, but it will allow for verification.

If that statement is made, I expect (sadly, I no longer say what I would once have said, "I fear") the "disassociationists" will go forward with plans to disassociate dioceses from the Episcopal Church and provinces from the Anglican Communion. But since I expect them to go forward with such plans anyway, I will at least know it is going forward in a context of clear expectations and established and affirmed structures.

"It seems to me that, like it or not, any kind of Alternative Primatial Oversight will have to involve change or adaptation in the legal structures of the Episcopal ...Any official changes will require the official participation of the acknowledged authorities: and whether the dissidents like it or not, the Presiding Bishop is the Presiding Bishop, the General Convention is the General Convention, and it is high time for the Archbishop to work to engage the dissidents with the legal authorities whose consent will be required for any legitimate (i.e., licit) adaptations to accommodate dissent."

And good luck to him. That is exactly the problem with the dissadents. They refuse to accept the legitimate results of gencon 03 and 06.

If these actions violate their consciences, they should act like my Mennonite neighbors who refuse to pay what they call war taxes, who refuse to register for the draft and are willing to take the consequences of fines or jail time.

Our dissadent minority should either stay and try to change things via our polity or they should just leave, and if that means leaving property and pension fund, so be it. That would be acting with integrity. I've not seen much of that from them.

Cynthia,
"Our dissadent minority should either stay and try to change things via our polity or they should just leave, and if that means leaving property and pension fund, so be it. That would be acting with integrity. I've not seen much of that from them."
Can I suggest a quick surf to http://theamia.org/ ? There you will find details of their congregations. The vast majority have left property behind - and depending on the terms of their pension fund - that too.
If you want to find a number of people who have left TEC under the terms you desire, you can. It just takes a little looking.
I am open to correction naturally, but ISTM that on examining the websites of a number of these ex-TEC groups the vast majority have left without property.
There have been those - not many - who have refused to pay, like your Mennonite neighbours, and have been deposed.

Thank you Marshall, for the comment on the canonical issue, and Cynthia for that on the "dissidency." On the latter, I agree in principle, and that is what I would do: if GC passed a canon with which I could not live, I would renounce my orders and go elsewhere. But I have long ago given up telling other folks what to do -- they usually don't, in spite of my good advice! ;-).

So the issue for me is the practical one. How do we deal with the present state of affairs, and whiat might come out of this meeting. My thought is that we could do some careful and generous exploration of our present canons on missionary dioceses. In some cases we might see old dioceses that were divided reextend their influence over formerly ceded territory, while the Network folks there form their non-geographic diocese / province. (This clearly might happen in California, as San Joaquin is result of a relatively recent division.)

These changes are not impossible, though they are novel, and might in the long run accomplish the separation of the conjoined twins that Bishop Katharine referred to: without damage to either side, even though the operation be painful or difficult.

Br. Tobias,

That was an interesting suggestion RE: how "we might see old dioceses that were divided reextend their influence over formerly ceded territory, while the Network folks there form their non-geographic diocese / province."

But what shall we do with Fort Worth, which was formed from part of Dallas ? Neither of these dioceses show much tolerance or generosity for anything or anyone approaching mainstream Episcopalianism...

Can we "bottom line" this thing. This is about a group of people who want to roll back the church to the 1950s, and want gays back in the closet because of the "ick" factor. Everything else--all the posturing, cries of orthodoxy, using Lambeth and the ABC for cover, etc., is nothing more then a group--maybe 10% of TEC--who know that if that split off they'll end up as relevant as AMiA and the Reformed Episcopal Church. In other words, irrelevant. So, they want to steal the property and other goodies, get the ABC to recognize them, and then claim that somehow they--10% of TEC--represent Anglicanism in the US.

If it wasn't so sad, it would be funny.

Until Duncan and his Rebellion needed cover, did anyone even KNOW who the ABC was? Until Duncan and his Rebellion wanted to blow up TEC and ransack the store on the way out, did anyone even CARE when Lambeth met?

The comic-tragic figure in all this is, of course, Rowan Williams. He reminds me of Ashley from "Gone with the Wind." Can't say yes or no, and won't tell Duncan, Akinola & Co. to knock it off.

How do we deal with Duncan and these people? Show them the door. There's no doing business with these people. What they want is an illusion--the church of the 1950s.

Enough already. Lord, where is the leadership??? Where are the leaders with guts, courage, and conviction?

Dave

May God watch over you while you are away. You and I might have had some interesting exchanges, but I have always been grateful for your honesty because it enabled healing to happen that would not have been possible without your forthright contributions. I shall miss you.

Let the Networkers keep San Joaquín and may the Episcopal Majority go back to the Diocese of California.

Wouldn't that be Salmonic?

Obviously, David, this would not be the solution for Dallas / Ft Worth. But what if a new missionary diocese for the "reappraisers" in those places were allowed to form and function as such? I just think we've been paralyzed by a limited number of apparent options; stupefied by a lack of creativity in response to real disagreements. Perhaps it is because I firmly believe that in 50 years all of this will have faded to a sad memory that I hope for a minimally destructive solution in the meantime.

Today's note from the PB coincides fairly much exactly with my take on what this meeting was to be about, and what it might accomplish. Can't we give our PB the room to function creatively, along with the PB-elect?

With Iker and others either claiming or implying that the ABC has 'ordered' this meeting, and with Iker pre-demanding APO as an outcome, this response from G K Cameron, Deputy Secretary General of the Anglican Communion Office to an inquiry about the meeting is instructive. It certainly resonates with the PB's description of the genesis of the meeting. Here's the link to the original posting: http://inchatatime.blogspot.com/2006/08/thus-spake-secretary-general.html

And here's the message quoted:

"Thank you for your email. Its contents have been carefully noted. The meeting in September to which you refer has been convened precisely so that bishops who are asking for alternative primatial oversight can meet with their current primate and his successor to determine from within the Episcopal Church the best way forward. While the Archbishop of Canterbury had a role in establishing this meeting, and will be represented at it by the Secretary General of the Anglican Communion, it is intended to allow the Episcopal Church to reach its own conclusions, and does not represent any independent action by the Archbishop of Canterbury at all."

You may like to read Presiding Bishop Frank Griswold's recent comment on the meeting, which you will find here. [Here is included a link to the ACO site for the PB's statement]

Do please join with us in praying for the well-being of the Episcopal Church and the Anglican Communion and that God's will for all God's children may be clearly known and heeded.

G K Cameron
Deputy Secretary General
Anglican Communion Office

Jim
That material is already reported in a later news item, see
http://www.thinkinganglicans.org.uk/archives/001882.html