It was fatuous of me to call the Bishop’s remark “shocking blasphemy.” That description could only apply properly to the statements of someone who was a Christian and was perverting the faith. But the Episcopal Church USA, with the ordination of Robinson, has ceased being a Christian body. It has now become what it has been tending toward for many years, an organization devoted to the advancement of secular liberalism. And what could be a more typically secular liberal sentiment than that “global peace is the peace that passes understanding”?

Mr. Auster,

What also of Chane’s saying that God sent the Angel Gabriel to reveal the sacred Koran to the prophet Mahomet? No conscientious Christian may believe that God did any such thing, nor may he believe that the Koran is sacred or Mahomet was a prophet. Chane states these central tenets of Islam, which are unalterably opposed to Christian doctrine, as facts.

What Chane does here is worse than merely dismissing the faith of which he pretends to be a minister, evil as that is: he adopts (at least in this sermon) an alien religion utterly hostile to [what used to be] his own. The whole sermon is another depressing example of the thoughtless modernist Christian ecumenism which pretends that there are no differences that really matter among Christianity, Judaism and Islam, which always leads to Christian concessions to other religions, never to drawing their adherents to Christianity.

As a Catholic I confess with sorrow that post-Vatican II popes have given much aid and comfort to that particular error. HRS

In another day and another age, this sort of horrifying heresy would not have been tolerated; good Christian men would have risen up to cast out the wolves prowling among the sheep. The heresy is their sin; timidity is ours.

I would like to add something to my previous post. While I alluded to it, I failed to be explicit.

Mr. Auster says that the Episcopal Church in the United States ceased to be a Christian body at the consecration of the homosexual Robinson in New Hampshire. That may be so, but that is not the whole of the damage ECUSA’s actions do to Episcopalians who are Christians, or who at least believe they still are. ECUSA continues to hold itself out as a Christian denomination, indeed an orthodox one linked by apostolic succession to Our Lord’s presentation of the keys to Saint Peter himself. The damage would be bad enough if ECUSA honestly and openly rejected Christianity. What ECUSA (and not only ECUSA, of course) does is worse: Christians are deliberately misled into believing that one can embrace the secular humanist agenda in all its bizarre and destructive manifestations and still be a good Christian. Shepherds such as Chane (and Griswold, Spong, Robinson…) put the souls of their flocks in mortal peril.

Please forgive the coarse use of “ECUSA.” It takes up less space and is easier to type, like using RC for Papists. HRS

One wonders whether the eminent Dr. Chane has any idea what is in the Koran - for example, the many suras that specifically call for the murder of those deviating from the faith. My guess is that this eminent divine has never read the Koran which he nevertheless feels free to proclaim as divine scripture in the Christian tradition.

Mr. Sutherland is correct: Chane’s statement of core Moslem tenets also suggests that he is not a Christian. Yet I would say that this one remark by one bishop in a sermon does not represent as decisive an abandonment of Christianity as the collective official act of the ECUSA in endorsing the ordination of a proclaimed practicing sodomite.

I have known for several years that the hierarchy of the ECUSA consists of non-Christians, and that at least some of them, e.g. Presiding Bishop Frank Griswold and of course Bishop Spong, were evil men. The Episcopal bishops’ lack of belief in Christianity, and their continual endorsements of any religion other than Christianity, are familiar. However, as bad as things were, one could still say that the Church, though veering very far from Orthodoxy, was still a Christian church. But with the ordination of Bishop Robinson, I just don’t think that’s possible any more. Definitional lines can be stretched, but not forever. In ordaining Robinson the ECUSA passed beyond the definitional limits of Christianity.

I don’t think this blatantly homosexualist man’s elevation to such a high post will stand. I sense something brewing; quiet but firm opposition building. I posted the following comment to Turnabout on Dec. 18th:

“As regards the Episcopalians’ beyond-idiotic one-hundred-percent capitulation to homosexuality, I happened to see an interview on one of the standard morning shows a few minutes ago … in which it emerged that there is concrete deep and widespread dissatisfaction with the consecration of this man who abandoned his wife and children to live with another man in a homosexual relationship, and apparently a genuine rebellion is brewing. The Anglican lay community is not going to stand for this — it will be either outright schism of international scope, or this homosexual person will have to resign, IMHO.”

I wish I could agree with Unadorned that protest from lay Anglicans will compel Robinson’s resignation. What is more likely is that the very liberal U.S. Episcopalian establishment will rally ‘round its man (they have already endured a lot of criticism without yielding). As is too often the case in these fights, the Leftist side will have the courage of its perverted convictions, while those who oppose will for the most part not be motivated to fight the Leftists with the same fervor. Most Episcopalians (if my wife’s not grossly liberal parish is indicative) are not paying any attention to the homosexualist onslaught. The Archbishop of Canterbury (who very likely is personally untroubled by the development) will conjure a fudge that accepts the new status quo, and Episcopalianism and Anglicanism generally will continue their “faith journey” away from Christianity.

Those who refuse to accept that new status quo will either split from the Episcopal Church, or become Catholics and learn to love the Novus Ordo. HRS

Some wag over at National Review Online the other day suggested that in the aftermath of the Right Reverend’s speech, the Episcopal Church would now be in a position to carry out gay marriages, followed by pushing over a wall onto the two grooms.

That sounds like the new National Review: greet each new cultural catastrophe with a knowing smile and a supercilious wisecrack, then accommodate to the new status quo. HRS

What do you expect from a bunch of Prots (=:

The ‘perverted trinity’ Spong, Robinson, Regas :

One of Gene Robinson’s supporters is a bishop called John Spong. Despite his own consecration promises, Spong is an outspoken advocate of a
wholesale rejection of all the main truths of the Christian faith including the divinity of Jesus, his death for our sins, his bodily
resurrection, and even the existence of God. He is accepted by and acceptable to the liberals who support Gene Robinson. Many of them agree
with him.

John Spong has recently visited this Diocese of Newcastle to teach his views. Every month the Diocese sends a bulletin to all the clergy. In
this month’s edition another visit of John Spong is being advertised. He will be leading what is called a ‘spirituality workshop’.

The ‘enemy’ has infiltrated ‘our’ churches!!

Now, what a coincidence that Reverends from both coasts of the US spoke at the same church? Rev Spong a ‘retired’ Episcopal Bishop of Newark NJ
and a Reverend Regas from an All Saints Church
in Pasadena California. The PLOT thickens. There appears to be a ground swelling within a number of Churches. We live sheltered lives here in New England and elsewhere. This is happening all around us and we don’t notice. I didn’t realize the extent to which this has grown. I see an acceleration of these kind of events…and I am not really tuned into it…


Some content of of www.ststephens-columbus 2001 St. Stephen’s began a speaker’s series intended to bring progressive thinkers to the parish. Renita Weems, John Spong, Joseph Sprague, George Regas, and Marcus Borg are some of the recent lecturers.

Note how they call these people ‘progressive’ thinkers. So, what are the rest of us who try to read the Bible and can’t ignore what it says…’Regressive’ idiots?

jeff 12/29/03

The Reverend Regas said it was wrong for Franklin Graham to mention Christ the Savior at a 9/11 ceremony…..could ‘offend’Islamics

jcp

If jcp thinks that some Episcopal clerics are anti-Christian, he should check back at VFR in a day or two. I’m going to post a letter by an Episcopal priest that is one of the shocking things I’ve ever seen.