The only thing I really care to know re the "Southern Cone-affiliated Diocese of Pittsburgh" is, when are they going to vacate the Episcopal Church property that they illegally occupy?

As one who would be perfectly happy to get shot of my building, I wonder what JCF would actually do with the structures if he took title. Is he planning to fill formerly reasserter churches with new converts? If so he's bucking every demographic trend. There hasn't been a non-Evangelical plant in Pittsburgh since the mid-1980s.

Or does he mean that he wants the buildings in order to sell them off? If so, he apparently thinks it worthwhile to hamstring an existing Christian community and its service to a neighborhood, in order to maintain a brand name.

Will he pledge to replace plants like Shepherd's Heart Fellowship - the only congregation whose membership is almost exclusively drawn from Pittsburgh's homeless population - and can he do so? Its easy to say that, as the Episcopal Church, reappraisers are entitled to the assets, but the assets aren't just sitting in the bank; they're funding existing programs.

Why not offer to keep funding reasserter ministries that are serving local neighborhoods? I've heard no indication of that. At least the former Diocese kept funding minority school outreach by a reappraiser parish from 2003 to 2007. At the time, that was dismissed as an attempt to avoid bad publicity by cutting services to African Americans, but the same arguments hold today for Shepherd's Heart and Pittsburgh's homeless or Seeds of Hope and its after-school programs. You can't have it both ways.

Jeremy:

Are you so sure that EVERY member of every reasserter parish is leaving? It's not possible that a substantial minority in each parish would prefer to remain Episcopalian? For that matter, what rules were followed in the parochial votes? Was it a majority of those voting? Or a majority of those entitled to vote? And what were the rules regarding entitlement to vote?

But, more importantly, under canon law, those assets do not belong to the parish...are you suggesting violating canon law?

Reasserters, reappraisers, it really is convenient to single out the "other" you can use both as a focus for your fear and anger and a touchstone by which to judge your own righteousness. I know this because I do exactly the same thing with Evangelicals. I have recently, however, begun dialogue with an Evangelical, who is making it harder for me to maintain the fiction of the monolithic Evangelical juggernaut running roughshod over the Gospel and everyone who does not follow their closed judgemental religion. I don't know who to hate and fear now. Of course, Jeremy, both hate and fear are things we are pretty much commanded by God not to do. Spoilsport.

Jeremy I would like to have my church of 38 years back. Yes, Trinity Washington! Your friend Millard systematically forced out loyal Episcopalians. This was a tactic used throughout this diocese. I can call on quite a few people from many parishes. Maybe you need to build your own churches with your own money.

"At least the former Diocese kept funding..."

Some mistake surely? I thought it was a fundamental principle of those who voted to affiliate with the Southern Cone that there was no break in identity with the previous TEC entity.

There weren't any parish plants that were non evangelical in Pittsburgh because the evangelicals running Pittsburgh were to busy throwing out broad church folks and replacing them with mindless automatons. These people don't want to ask what the parables could mean or how they might apply to a particular position, they want a definite answer. Why use parables if the answers are so clear. If you want to be told what to pray, pay and obey join the Roman Catholic Church.

As for the property. Henry Scriven, (who lucky for the CofE is going to be helping out in Oxford come Jan) said something about saddling us with property we certainly couldn't fill or afford. I have to say the evangelical side hasn't exactly filled every church in Pittsburgh. Let's look at Mr. Wilson's (former president of the Standing Committe) present parish. Hm... not in debt and just filled to the rafters every Sunday, eh???? or what about Trinity Cathedral, standing room only???? A lot of the Trinity people took sanctuary at Calvary. Trinity is practically empty.

I know of churches, in the Pittsburgh, which have people who didn't want to leave TEC but because of the parish family have acquiesced for the good of the family and are now in the SC. Can't say the other members of the family have done the same for them (by staying in TEC). So much for love.

As for the churches working with the homeless, the less fortunate, why can't the diocese of Pittsburgh continue to provide services for those parishes such as Shepherd's Heart. It's not like all the money walked off to the SC.

Pat,

No, of course they're not, as witness those conservative parishes remaining in the non-Southern Cone diocese. But what would YOU do with a parish that's 10 percent one way and 90 percent the other? Could the 10 percent keep the building open to serve the local community?

I see nothing wrong with shared-space arrangements, where they can be arranged, perhaps with a property-management committee equally staffed from both sides.

Ford,

Good point and I don't deny it. I have a dear friend at the Cathedral who is very critical of Bishop Duncan but who - I recently discovered to my surprise - is pro-life, which I would consider a first order issue. There's a hardening on both sides now, which I don't welcome (little though readers of Thinking Anglicans may believe it). Part of the reason, I think, is that both extremes want to force an absolute choice.

Simon,

I would hope that on this site, at least, we could deal with existential realities. There was one diocese until October this year; now there are two. Apparently we're going to leave it to the courts to determine which is the "legitimate" one. Frankly, I have ceased to care. How will such determination serve any of us if hearts (not theology, but hearts) remain unchanged?

Bob,

I can't speak for how Jonathan Millard (whom I barely know) ran things in his time, but surely Jonathan only built (more aggressively perhaps) on what people like John Leggett (whom I do know) had been doing since the early 1970s.

A far as the "mindless automatons" remark is concerned, my experience is that there's a remarkable range of people, some so fervent that it's annoying, some so partisan that it's embarrassing and some so political that you feel that they might give a Chicago ward heeler a run for his money. And then there are the humble, the self-denying, the spiritually intense, some of whom, like Scott Quinn, are still serving the non-Southern Cone diocese. Don't condemn all the products of Trinity School for Ministry just because Geoff Chapman gets on your nerves.

And even if it's true that moderate parishes have been "subverted," why is that Calvary - with all its resources - hasn't been able to plant another congregation in East Liberty? If anyone could, they could. It is true that not every parish with an evangelical rector has grown exponentially (we certainly haven't) but people are at least trying. Read my fleeting accounts of those new plants and you will see people who are combining their service with their evangelism and recognizing that people often need material nourishment as much as they need spiritual nourishment (after-school activities in Bloomfield and job-training in Coraopolis).

And everybody here ought at least to approve of Somerset Anglican Fellowship who left their parish with nothing. They are still praying for the 20 percent who opted to stay with TEC and want them to flourish.

Oh, and for the record, the Cathedral is my parish and I stayed - under our peculiar arrangement - for the good of the family, at least in the short term.

"Could the 10 percent keep the building open to serve the community?"

If the 90 percent take it, we'll never know, will we? And how do you "share space" if the two groups have wildly diverse worship styles? One group wants a central altar with candles and vestments; the other wants a central pulpit with the barest of decorations. One sees statues as objects of divine art; the other as "graven images". Do we redecorate the church a couple of times a week?

Further, and perhaps more importantly, doesn't that simply confuse the community they are each trying to serve? Is this the St. Somebody that welcomes gays? Or the one that condemns them? Oh--at 10 o'clock they're welcoming and at 11 they're condemning?

Which leads naturally to the question about planting new parishes: There's more to doing that than simply having the resources; one must have a message the un-churched community is looking to hear. I suspect the message being given in Pittsburgh is pretty muddled right now.

"Is he planning to fill formerly reasserter churches with new converts? If so he's bucking every demographic trend."

You betcha! The Apostles didn't take account of "every demographic trend", and neither should TEC.

[You forget one other important point. I also expect to fill TEC churches w/ the "newly reconciled": I hope and pray you'll be one of them, Jeremy. Loving God, give ALL of us reconciling hearts like yours!]

Let's see, who might be included properly among those to whom Duncan and Company will preach their special, unchanged and uncorrected, eternal conservative gospel?

First, screen. Possible converts must pledge - anti-TEC, anti-Canada plus pro-Realignment stuff. Antigay stuff is said to be core creed, too. Two mommies or two daddies with children need not apply to Duncan's new kingdom feast. Various sorts of educated intellectuals are also not all that welcome, just to the extent that any of those possible converts reads peer-reviewed science journals frequently enough to take them seriously as a pilgrim and believer. Such potential converts might think (mistakenly?) that God was speaking to them through just that research?

Funny how the allegedly apostate TEC folks and Duncan folks could still agree on services which are witness in action - to homeless, to other populations?

But then, our new realigned, Southern Coned Duncanites might actually accidentally rub shoulders with, say, a progressive Pburgh believer or a gasp queer believer? No go then.

The Duncanites are way too fond of their hot button either/ors: Either progressive believers or queer folks are dirty and dangerous and contaminating - or maybe, not. Everything in the scriptures between end of the Pentateuch (away ye prophets, major and minor), and the start of the epistles plus revelations is of dubious realignment value for the next while.

Realignment knows best I suppose. Created whole, intact, unchangeable just like species. Lionel Deimel is getting it alright, about the emerging Anglican Duncanite Southern Cone fairylands. Ooops, well not that other sort of fairy, I mean.

Let us all watch to see if SC even bothers with reviewing and voting to confirm Duncan's new election. Que Viva Deposed Recife.

The moment Canterbury falls big time for any of this new realigned province stuff, it will all show up gangbusters in other provinces, including England.

"pro-life, which I would consider a first order issue"

For you, but it really isn't on the radar in this country. Not just in my parish, mind, but hardly anywhere. I suspect you think me, like your friend at the cathedral, to be a reappraiser, believing in nothing, considering the Bible nothing more than a collection of folk tales, at best, and seeking to destroy the Church, evil fag that I am. It might surprise you to learn that I am not in favour of SSBs, am an Anglocatholic who believes that the older the Tradition, the more reliable it is (and that newfangled Reformation type stuff is certainly NOT old), attend Don Harvey's old parish, in Don Harvey's old diocese, where because of his behaviour he has lost the large amount of respect he could have expected, and about whose current bishop some conservatives have publically lied. Did not your experience with your friend at the cathedral teach you a lesson about not stereotyping people? It takes a while, one lesson isn't enough to teach anybody not to go slotting people into groups so they can have something to vent their anger at, especially when that anger is born of such fear. Keep at it! I'm not there yet either, but I'm working at it.

Ford,

I just believe I demonstrated the diversity of both sides in my previous post (and the fact that we all - myself included - make dangerous assumptions about the "other.") I don't see that we can do away entirely with categories. Doesn't the very title of this blog imply that conservatives are "unthinking" Anglicans?

To many people I know "life," in its broadest sense, IS a first order issue, which is why, for example, I regard as deplorable efforts to bar pro-life gays and lesbians for particpating in the March for Life.

I know nothing about you but what you post and to that I responded. Whence the hostility? I thought blogs like these were intended to facilitate dialog. In any case, I don't see conservative leaders as perfect either, even if I believe they do have their own integrity.

What I was trying to map out were ways that the best of both sides can be preserved. Apparently most people round here seem to think it a futile exercise. A little ironic really.

Jeremy:

Does your "pro-life" position include opposition to the death penalty? To torture?

I do apologize Jeremy if I seemed a little steamed. This isn't an easy process and more than likely will have to go the courts. I did read some of your post on Bruce R's page. I'll sit down to read later. Father Leggett has known me since I was very very young. I saw him at convention and we caught up. We both know where we stand, he the evangelical and myself the progressive Anglo-Catholic.

As for Calvary planting new churches, I would think that would be the diocese's responsibility but even so, they have more churches in the east end than I think they need. Calvary is a stone's throw to Holy Cross, St. Andrew's and Redeemer as well as Ascension. It will be interesting to see if Trinity can serve two masters. Who do you pay your parish share to? TEC or SC? How get's to approve you're selection of priest ect...? Seems to me to be a tight rope walk extraordinaire.

Pat,

I fear I'm taking us away from the topic of the post, but to answer your question yes (anti-death penalty) and yes (anti-torture). To argue otherwise seems to me to deny the possibility of redemption.

Bob,

No problem. I don't really have any answers for you. I'll be interested to see how you view my interpretation of the past, since you've lived through much of it.

If the Cathedral project works it will have to be through divine intervention, but aren't we told that all things are possible with God? Some of the details are in the resolution that's available on our website. Future provosts/deans will have to be approved by both bishops - that should be interesting. We haven't quite decided how funds will be distributed, but there will be a divided assessment - again, that will have the lawyers scratching their heads.

I'm glad you get on with John Leggett. He's a wonderful priest and a great historian.

"Doesn't the very title of this blog imply that conservatives are "unthinking" Anglicans? "

Only if conservatives are prevented from posting here, which is certainly not the case.

"Whence the hostility?"

I apologize, I am guilty of making a pile of assumptions and going off half cocked. This stems from your use of the words "reasserter" and "reappraiser" and your obvious belief that schism is inevitable. Those two words are used by people who usually bring with them a series of assumptions, as is the idea that we have to split. Why? Why do we have to split? I mean, if you do not believe gay people are evil and contaminating, why go in to schism? If you don't believe that the Evil Hell Bound Liberals are out to destroy the Church, why go into schism? I would have to ask you, "Why the hostility from 'your camp'?" Why do conservatives lie about gay people? Why have conservatives constructed this myth that they are being persecuted by some liberal "reassessor" plot? Why all the slander about liberals believing nothing and having no respect for Scripture? I am angry because I don't like being lied about by people for whom the romanticism of thinking of themselves as part of a poor persecuted minority is more important than the Gospel. These things and more usually accompany the use of words like "reassessor". I don't know if this applies to you. You certainly haven't had the time to show how you feel about such issues. I judged you harshly and quickly, and for that, and for making you representative of all conservatives, I apologize. Now get me started on "progressive"!