Truth or Fiction?

what is more damaging, truth or fiction? In the Episcopal Church we meet, we discuss, sometimes we yell, sometimes we even act out a bit, but we never fabricate the truth. One may not always like what we as Episcopalians do, but we do it in front of everyone and we generally say what we mean and mean what we say. That seems to be our downfall.

Take for example the members of ACNA, in fact let's talk about the now deposed Bishop of San Joaquin, John David Schofield. For years he was asked, "Are you taking the diocese of San Joaquin out of the Episcopal Church?" For years, he responded with a resounding NO! In fact, there are at least two pastoral letters from Mr. Schofield that clearly stated he had no such intention. Then, like a "bolt from on high, he does just that! Yes, in December of 2007 he pulls the diocese into a half-baked (maybe full baked) province from South America led by a renegade from who knows where. (In a related story, Archbishop Venables is now so broke he cannot pay attention and is need, once again, of the North Americans to come to his financial rescue). Now, Mr. Schofield will vehemently deny he did anything, after all, it was his convention delegates that did all the work, but read his statement to convention of that year, he certainly did not tell the truth.

Now, three years later, the Episcopal Church meets and passes two significant resolutions on inclusion. The Archbishop of Canterbury was there, he spoke. We discussed, debated and then passed the resolution. Then, we simply did what we said we were going to do. Everyone in the worldwide Anglican Communion gets their knickers in a twist and then we, The Episcopal Church, get thrown off committees and bounced from sub-groups. The GAFCON archbishops come together and agree to exercise "gracious restraint" and it turns out that it is neither gracious nor restrained. Nothing happens. The Communion Partners, which Archbishop Williams is particularly enamored with, attends the last GAFCON conference complete with voice at the convention yet they say, "Oh, we just want to be good Episcopalians, we do not want to tear down the Episcopal Church, we want to build it up." Hooey!

So the Episcopal Church says what it means and does what it says and gets blasted. The GAFCON/ACNA/CANA/AMiA folks create fiction, borrow property indefinitely, violate territorial rights, continue to practice holy orders after being duly deposed and generally reek mayhem on the Anglican Communion and they get -- the run of the show! Well, I am glad we got that straightened out!