Anglican Communion Bigotry Continues

Katie Sherrod wrote the following on the Walking With Integrity blog today. It's a great post. But it's upsetting that many of the Bishops in the Anglican Communion believe it is entirely appropriate to practice bigotry. They've banned Bishop Robinson from next Tuesday evening's purple hat meeting.

Gordon

MIND THE GAP 

by Katie Sherrod

For one brief tiny second, I think there was a rainbow over the green field where the Integrity/Changing Attitude Eucharist took place this afternoon before a crowd of 160 people, including 33 bishops, mostly from the US. The Canterbury Cathedral loomed dramatically over the trees beyond the altar.

It was a cool blustery mostly sunny afternoon interrupted occasionally by brief light showers of rain. As the second shower was passing, the sun came out, creating a rainbow just as I glanced up. I grabbed my photographer’s arm, but it was gone before I could get words out.

Did I imagine it? Was it wishful thinking?

It seemed much too apt to be true, that tiny glimpse of color, so I’m assuming I imagined it. One often feels that way in the Anglican Communion – thinking one has glimpsed some hope only to find it was an illusion.

But this afternoon, there was one genuine icon of hope for LGBT folks, and that was Bishop Gene Robinson, striding across the road from St. Stephens encircled by a small group of American bishops come to stand in solidarity with him at the service.

The irony is that at the very moment Bishop Robinson wasn’t feeling very hopeful himself. He had just learned that the house of bishops of the 38 “national” provinces are supposed to meet Tuesday evening and that “they” – the Lambeth Conference organizers – had decreed that Bp. Robinson was not to be allowed to attend the meeting of the US House of Bishops. It might make it appear that he is a participant in the conference, something “they” apparently want to avoid at all costs, lest it offend – who? The people who are boycotting Lambeth?

It was the very thing he had pleaded with his brothers and sisters not to allow to happen – that they not allow the “powers that be” to separate them.

So Bp. Robinson was grateful for the Eucharist, because, as he said, “Eucharist always helps.”

Integrity and Changing Attitude had joined forces to put on the service for the purpose of praying for the bishops at the Lambeth Conference. It was a startling sight – the groups that had been the most wounded by the actions of Lambeth 1998 were here praying for the success of the Lambeth Conference, while those who had most celebrated the outcome of the 1998 conference were boycotting it.

The service, presided over by Colin Coward of Changing Attitude, seemed to lighten the spirits of those present. While a Eucharist like this is fairly common at, say, a General Convention or even a diocesan convention in the U.S., it’s almost unheard of in England, where the leadership of the Church of England tries to pretend there are no such folk in their pews, and certainly not in their pulpits, behind their altars, or under their miters. The mind boggles, doesn’t it?

So the LGBT folk from England, Wales, Scotland, and Ireland who were present were mildly amazed to see an openly gay priest at the altar and hear a lesbian preach.

Susan Russell was at her best, preaching a sermon of God’s inclusive love that clearly touched the hearts of many of those sitting or standing on the grass in front of her.

She started out by talking about that ubiquitous warning of the British rail system, “Mind the Gap,’ the warning to passengers to be aware of the distance between the train and the platform.

“I can’t help but wonder if minding the gap isn’t one of the ways an island people cope with the challenges of gaps that don’t have anything to do with trains! It is a mindset that says `gaps happen and we mind them and keep moving along’ that is part of the DNA of not only the English people but of the English Church.

“It is the essence of an Anglican comprehensiveness that has – up until now – been able to hold together a world-wide communion in spite of the gaps between theologies and polities and languages and liturgies.

“As this Lambeth Conference begins, I’m wondering if `minding the gap’ might not be one of the most important things those of us who love, care about and pray for this Anglican Communion can do,” she said.

She reminded the listeners that Jesus promised that “the truth will set you free.”

“To mind the gap is to commit ourselves to tell the truth about the very real gaps that exist between the experiences, worldviews, and theologies of many members of the Anglican Communion. It is equally to speak the truth that the Gospel we share is stronger than the differences we acknowledge,” she said.

“Gaps do not have to become chasms and differences do not have to become divisions – in spite of what you might have read in the Sunday papers this morning from the Gospel According to Durham,” she said, a reference to N.T. Wright, the bishop of Durham, who compared the ordination of a gay bishop to the invasion of Iraq in the Sunday Times today.

She said the church at its best has “not only the potential but the vocation to bridge not only the gaps that separate us from each other within the communion but the gaps that separate the church from the world it has been created to serve as the Body of Christ … as Jesus’ hands and feet at work in the world.

“The truth that will set us free is that Jesus spent a WHOLE lot less time talking about who was going to get to heaven than he did talking about bringing heaven to earth. `Thy kingdom come, thy will be done ON EARTH AS IT IS IN HEAVEN’ are arguably among the most familiar words in all of Christian faith – the words our Lord Jesus `taught us to pray.’

“So my wondering today – and we’ve happily got a great lot of bishops here who should be theologically trained enough to give us an answer -- is this: When did the litmus test for going to heaven become correctly guessing who else God has on the invitation list? “

“Jesus didn’t have a single word to say about guessing the guest list … or about doctrines or dogmas or creeds -- or even about Lambeth Conferences! In the gospel from Matthew we heard this morning he quite clearly tells us that it is not our job to fuss about the weeds – or what even to decide which ones are the weeds! Jesus will deal with that at harvest time, he assures us. And it is high time the church took him at his word and -- leaving what he’s asked us to leave to him to him – to get on with the work he has given US to do.

She pointed out that Jesus was VERY clear about what that work looks like -- “inasmuch as you did it unto the least of these.”

“The question Jesus asked was, `did you bring water to the thirsty, food to the hungry, clothing to the naked?’ … not `did you agree on liturgical practice, come to consensus on a biblical hermeneutic, unravel the mystery of human sexuality?’

“Paul’s letter to the Romans tells us that the creation waits with eager longing “In hope that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage …” and that is as true in 21st century Canterbury as it was in 1st century Corinth. The whole creation. Not just one part or parcel – one race or gender or orientation or identity. The WHOLE creation-- free of poverty, free of violence, free of exploitation, free of oppression, free of sexism, free of racism, free of homophobia. And what will set the creation free is the truth.

She told her listeners that “our job is to tell the truth about the God who loved us enough to become one of us and then called us walk in love with God and with our neighbors. It is THAT truth that is core of the Gospel message of love and hope and inclusion and it is THAT truth that has the power to set the creation free. If we will claim it. If we will proclaim it. If we will get on with the work WE have been given to do.”

She then told Robert Fulgham’s story of the time he had to mind the children while the other grownups were off doing something else. He set the children to sorting themselves into giants, wizards and dwarfs, a game the purpose of which was mostly to run around and make noise.

Then, While the groups huddled in frenzied, whispered consultation, a tug came at my pants leg. A small child stands there looking up, and asks in a small, concerned voice, "Where do the Mermaids stand?"

Where do the Mermaids stand?

A long pause. A very long pause. "Where do the Mermaids stand?" says I.

"Yes. You see, I am a Mermaid."

"There are no such thing as Mermaids."

"Oh, yes, I am one!"

She did not relate to being a Giant, a Wizard, or a Dwarf. She knew her category. Mermaid. And was not about to leave the game and go over and stand against the wall where a loser would stand. She intended to participate, wherever Mermaids fit into the scheme of things. Without giving up dignity or identity. She took it for granted that there was a place for Mermaids and that I would know just where.

Well, where DO the Mermaids stand? All the "Mermaids"--all those who are different, who do not fit the norm and who do not accept the available boxes and pigeonholes?

Answer that question and you can build a school, a nation, or a world on it.

What was my answer at the moment? Every once in a while I say the right thing. "The Mermaid stands right here by the King of the Sea!" says I.

So we stood there hand in hand, reviewing the troops of Wizards and Giants and Dwarfs as they roiled by in wild disarray.

It is not true, by the way, that Mermaids do not exist. I know at least one personally. I have held her hand. 

Russell went on to say, “A question I have answered a hundred times is `why are you going to Lambeth Conference?’

“My answer this afternoon IS this afternoon. It is this extraordinary gathering of wizards and dwarfs and giants and mermaids – standing together as the Body of Christ – receiving together the bread and wine made holy – going out together to proclaim the Good News of God in Christ Jesus to the world.

“It is the church telling the truth that will set it free – the truth that it is not true that faithful gay and lesbian Anglicans do not exist … for we know some personally. We have held their hand.

“And it is the opportunity to witness to that truth that will set this church – this communion – indeed this creation – free of the fear of inclusion and open to the Holy Spirit of God calling it to move forward in faith into God’s future. And may the God who has given us the will to do these things give us the grace and power to accomplish them. Amen.”

The passing of the peace took a long time as the gathered crowd shook hands, hugged, laughed, and wiped tears away. Then they moved into the Great Thanksgiving with a gusto not often seen in an English service, ending with a hymn beginning “We sing a love that sets all people free.”

The sound of the singing blew across the field, over the boys playing soccer, the child toddling carefully over the grass, the woman throwing a ball for her happy dogs, the couple walking hand in hand, drifting past the cathedral and off into a waiting world. 

--

Posted By Katie Sherrod to Walking With Integrity at 7/20/2008 11:58:00 AM 

....and from across the pond

My thoughts on Collier's Article:

Bishop Robinson exposed the hypocrisy of the Church of England. The COE exported English homophobia worldwide. Therefore it shares a big chunk of responsibility for the state in which the Anglican Communion now finds itself. Canterbury is reaping what it once sowed. This article unveils the hypocrisy of the COE and the Archbishops of Canterbury past and present. I'm happy that Collier exposed it. An open wound can be treated and dressed. That's when the healing begins.

gjb

The Scotsman

Saturday July 28, 2007

Millions believe this man is the Antichrist

ANDREW COLLIER

FORTY years after the decriminalisation of homosexuality in England and Wales, American The Rt Rev V Gene Robinson, the world's first openly gay bishop, explains to ANDREW COLLIER in an exclusive interview what it's like to be many Christians' number one enemy.

THE Devil has arranged to meet me in the lobby of a London tourist hotel. It's an odd choice of venue: Westminster Cathedral, the great temple of Roman Catholicism in England, is close by; and a glimpse of the fire and colour of Hell would have been more interesting.Nor does he look like Satan. No horns, no tail, no pitchfork, no smoke and sulphur. He's of medium height, thinning hair, wearing a smart shirt and tie. He's immediately warm, friendly, open and assured. I like him.

Yet millions of Christians the world over are convinced - absolutely assured - that this man is the Antichrist. They believe he is the Devil, sent to destroy the church from within. Welcome to the fan club of the Rt Rev V Gene Robinson, Primate of the American diocese of New Hampshire and the world's first openly gay bishop.

This week may mark the 40th anniversary of the legalisation of homosexuality in England and Wales, but attitudes in many ways still lag behind legislation. Even on this side of the Atlantic, Robinson's public homosexuality has made him the most controversial figure in worldwide Anglicanism since Henry VIII split with Rome in 1538 and created the church.

His ordination as bishop four years ago sparked a global outrage. Here was a cleric not only living in a sexual relationship with another man, but proud of it. Fellow Anglicans around the world erupted in fury. Some of the insults from other bishops in the 77 million strong worldwide Anglican Communion have been poisonous.

It is yet possible - some would say probable - that Robinson's election will very soon unleash a chain of events blowing the global church apart.'Did I think my ordination would be controversial? Of course,' he says. 'We took seriously the voices that were coming our way and we knew this would be a shock in many quarters. But did I have any idea that the furore over my consecration would be as broad or as deep as it was? Absolutely not.'

Robinson has been a controversial figure from the moment he came into the world. Born in 1947 in the Bible Belt in Lexington, Kentucky, he was not expected to survive the delivery, so his sharecropper parents were asked to give names for both the birth and death certificates. Expecting a girl, they opted for Vicky Imogene. He has never changed it.Religion was important to the young Gene Robinson. He grew up in the evangelical tradition - 'quite conservative, bordering on fundamentalist' - and went to church every Sunday.

By the age of 11, he was sensing that his sexual urges were different from those of his schoolmates.'It was not something easily admitted to oneself, let alone the world', he recalls. 'Friends of mine got hold of a Playboy magazine and I realised they were very much more interested in those pictures than I was.'Given what the church had taught me and what scripture seemed to be saying about this, being aware of my attraction to other boys seemed a despicable possibility. I was ashamed of it and fearful about it. I grew up in middle, southern America - a place where that sort of thing was not remotely tolerated. You just pray it's a phase you're going through; something you'll outgrow.'At the same time, he was feeling a calling towards God, rejecting his conservative church upbringing in favour of what he saw as the more tolerant, open, enquiring and honest nature of the Episcopal Church of the US, part of the worldwide Anglican Communion.

He went to seminary in New York, only three months after the Stonewall riots which heralded the beginning of the modern gay liberation movement. He found himself in a relationship with another man. 'It felt very positive to be falling in love with someone, to have them falling in love with me and to experience this kind of bond, and at the same time it was horrifically awful because I thought, 'Oh my goodness, maybe this isn't a passing phase. Maybe I am this way. Oh my God, what am I going to do?''Robinson knew his sexuality could destroy his chances of ordination. He had also always loved children and yearned for a family. So he went into therapy. 'It didn't work and almost never does, though I guess I thought it had. It didn't make the same-sex feelings go away, but I certainly felt emotionally, spiritually and physically ready for a relationship with a woman.'

When he met his wife, Boo, he was determined to maintain his honesty and integrity. 'Within a month of meeting her, I shared that all of my primary relationships had been with men, but that I had been in therapy to make a heterosexual relationship possible. She seemed to fully understand that. She said we loved each other very much and that if something happened we would deal with it together.'But his feelings did not go away.

After about ten years of marriage, and following the births of his two daughters, the doubts began to overwhelm him. 'We began to talk about it more and more, and sought counselling, trying to discern what was the right thing for us to do.' The couple finally decided to divorce. 'Almost everyone we knew were devastated. We had the marriage everyone hoped for. We tried to do the dissolution in a very holy way. We took a priest with us to the judge's chambers for the decree and went back to his church. In the context of the holy Eucharist we released each other from the vows we had taken, asked each other's forgiveness for ways in which we might have hurt one another, pledged ourselves to the joint raising of our children and gave our rings back as a symbol of the vows we no longer held each other to. It was one of the most healing moments of my whole life.'

ROBINSON DID NOT meet his life partner, Mark Andrew, until three years after the divorce, and by then his wife had remarried. 'The thing that has hurt me most in the press - and there have been some awful things said - is the charge that I abandoned my wife and children to move in with another man. There wasn't another man. And I never abandoned my responsibilities.'

He remains close to his ex-wife, and he says that his now grown-up children adore his partner. 'He's just wonderful with them. I would say I've been blessed. I've had the best of both worlds. I had a wonderful relationship with my wife and I have had a wonderful relationship now of almost 20 years with my partner.'

As he progressed through the church, it became clear that he was an exceptional pastor, capable of engaging with clergy and people in a compelling and spiritual way. He was also an effective and forceful administrator. As it became clear that he might be a candidate for bishop, so the voices against him became louder. His detractors have always found him difficult to target, he says, because he doesn't fit stereotypes. 'I have a wonderful family and had a wonderful marriage. I wasn't duplicitous. And I'm not a misogynist; I don't hate women. I have wonderful relationships with women.'

When he was elected bishop in 2003, it was by a clear two-thirds majority among the laity, the clergy and the American bishops. It was a massive validation, but it sparked a fireball. The death threats, many of them from fundamentalist Christians, flooded in.NEW HAMPSHIRE DOES not have any great cathedrals, and the most suitable venue which could be found for the ceremony was a local ice rink.

The event sparked worldwide interest and condemnation, and Robinson started to realise the scale of the price he would have to pay.'We had to spend $100,000 on security. I wore a bulletproof vest under my vestments. We did have a contingency plan that if shots were fired or a bomb went off and I was still alive, I was to be taken to a separate location. Three bishops - it takes three bishops to lay hands on you and ordain you - would be there with a photographer, so if I was still alive the consecration would not be thwarted.'The personal attacks on him have been venomous. The Baptist preacher Fred Phelps called him 'a disgusting, detestable, loathsome, filthy abomination - the great whoremonger'. Internet sites commonly refer to him as Satan or Beelzebub's Boy.

When Robinson recently went into rehab to deal with an alcohol problem, you could almost hear their whoops of joy. More serious is the response of other parts of the Anglican Communion. The Church of England has tried to maintain a lofty silence, though the Archbishop of Canterbury has asked him not to preach or celebrate Mass within his jurisdiction.

Churches such as those in Nigeria, which has 17 million Anglicans, have been more venomous, seeking to have the American church expelled from the communion. They have described gay people as 'beasts' with whom they will not share a room, and the Nigerian bishops said the Americans were a 'cancerous lump' which should be 'excised'.The whole issue is likely to come to a head at the Lambeth Conference next year. This gathering, held every ten years, brings together all the Communion's bishops for prayer and discussion at Canterbury. Robinson says he is the only bishop in the world who has so far not been invited.It could well turn into a firestorm. If the Americans and the Nigerians cannot share a room, let alone communion, it could well spell the end of Anglicanism as we know it. There will be plenty willing to blame Robinson for its demise.

HE TAKES COMFORT from a statement from the Scottish Episcopal Church, whose bishops said publicly two years ago that being homosexual is not a bar to ministry. 'It was supportive and I was grateful for it. As you can imagine, statements like that are few and far between at the moment in the Anglican Communion. It was a refusal to draw a line in the sand.'Robinson warns, though, that the price of support could see the Scottish church, as well as the American one, being forced out of the Communion. 'If the Episcopal Church in America is to bear some sort of punishment, it would not seem unlikely that all those who have stood with us might be so punished.'As a Christian, can he forgive his enemies? 'You know, I can. And here's why. They only believe what the church has taught them to believe, and I believed those same things myself for a very long time. That is what a gay person has to contend with. We've been taught the same things everyone else has. The church has taught us all to condemn homosexual behaviour. I would argue it has taught that mistakenly, but I can certainly understand why people feel this way, so no, I don't have any trouble forgiving.'

IT WAS FORTY YEARS AGO TODAY...THE Sexual Offences Act, which partially decriminalised homosexual acts in private between two men, both of whom had to be over 21, was given Royal Assent 40 years ago today, on 28 July 1967, after a night of heated debate in the Commons. It applied only to England and Wales: Scotland would have to wait until 1980 for such liberalisation, while the Armed Forces remained exempt until 2000.The Sexual Offences Act was significantly influenced by the Wolfenden Report of 1957, which recommended the decriminalisation of certain homosexual acts between consenting adults in the privacy of their homes, and established a certain legitimacy for same-sex relationships which hitherto had been mired in discrimination, repression and very necessary secrecy.

The gay community had hitherto existed as a shady and persecuted subculture, perpetually fearful of discovery which might destroy lives and reputations. One of the bill's sponsors, Lord Arran, commented: 'Perhaps a million human beings will be able to live in greater peace. I find this an awesome and marvellous thing.' He quoted from a letter Oscar Wilde, left, wrote after his release from Reading gaol: 'Yes, we shall win in the end; but the road will be long and red with monstrous martyrdoms.'The act set the age of consent between men at 21, and raised the penalties for certain 'acts of gross indecency'.

North of the Border, where sexual activity between males, consenting or otherwise, remained punishable by heavy prison sentences, the Scottish Minorities Group, later to become the Scottish Homosexual Rights Group and then Outright Scotland, was established in 1969, its campaigning playing a significant part in prompting the Criminal Justice (Scotland) Act of 1980.

The first International Gay Rights Conference was held in Edinburgh in 1974.In the Eighties, while openly gay pop stars such as Boy George, Jimmy Sommerville and Frankie Goes to Hollywood gave a certain popular voice to the gay community, the continuing harassment and even murder of gay men prompted the formation of Outrage!

And despite the advent of 'gay pride' (the UK's first Gay Pride march was held in London in 1972; Glasgay was founded in 1993), prejudice hardly evaporated overnight - witness the 'gay plague' witchhunts during the AIDS epidemic of the 1980s and 1990s.

In February 1994, the age of consent for sex between men was reduced by parliament to 18 and, after two attempted blocks by the House of Lords, in 2000 the age of consent for gay men was lowered to 16, on a par with heterosexuals. A further step on the road to normalisation was taken on 18 November, 2004, with the Civil Partnerships Act. More than 15,500 gay and lesbian couples put a seal on their relationships between December 2005, when the first registrations took place, and December 2006.

Just this week, a small but telling victory was chalked up when the reggae star Buju Banton, whose 1990 hit Boom Bye Bye, which advocated the shooting of gay men, pledged to desist from singing homophobic lyrics.

A WORD OF HOPE & A RESPONSE TO OUR PRESIDING BISHOP FROM BISHOP ROBINSON

I met Bishop Robinson three years ago this month when I had the privilege of meeting him when I went to New Hampshire for his investiture as Bishop of New Hampshire. He autographed my prayer book with the following inscription: "For Gordon-Blessings on you and your ministry of inclusion."

I was wearing my inclusion button and had taken the few I had left with me to New Hampshire. That was before we had our own button machine. Folks from St. Mark's and St. Andrew's Episcopal churches contributed to the fund to be able to have a local company make them.

When Bishop Robinson gave me a hug that evening and commented on the button and wrote what he wrote in my prayer book, a light went on in my head and realized that no, I'm not a member of the clergy, I'm not an elected official, but I do have a ministry which I didn't realize at the time.

I wondered what Bishop Robinson has been thinking about since the Episcopomess our Presiding Bishop brought home with her from Tanzania.

The Gentle Bishop has made TWO statements which I am proud to post here. Please keep Bishop Robinson in your prayers. There are very mean people who wish him harm.

A Word of Hope to my lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgendered brothers and sisters in Christ:

From: +Gene Robinson

In light of the recent Primates Meeting and our Presiding Bishop’s communication to the Church, I received the following plea from a dear and trusted sister:

“Gene, I don't know how you are this night, or if you can summon a word of hope, but the eyes of many LGBT people and our faithful allies are looking to you, tuning the ears of our hearts to hear where you see the hand of God in what feels like deep, deep betrayal.”

After a good number of sleepless nights and prayerful days, let me tell you where this gay man and Bishop of the Church stands, with respect to our beloved Church and our trustworthy and faithful God:

Let’s remember that, for now, nothing has changed. The Episcopal Church has been bold in its inclusion of us, “risking its life” for us in dramatic ways over these last few years. Not perfect, but bold. Just because The Episcopal Church has been invited to subvert its own polity and become a Church ruled by bishops-only, a Church that is willing to sacrifice the lives and ministries and dignity of its gay and lesbian members on the altar of unity, does not mean that we are going to choose to do it. That is yet to be determined. Let’s not abandon hope simply because that is possible. The Primates have the right to make requests of us (nevermind the threatening tone of those requests). We do not have to accede to those requests in exactly the terms in which they are made.

Nothing is surprising in this development. None of us thought this issue was settled, did we? None of us expected our detractors to stop their efforts – whether their goals be genuinely about the authority of scripture and its playing out in our lives as Christians, or whether those goals have more to do with power and money and influence. (BOTH are represented in the actions taken.) We are fighting a larger battle here. As you have heard me say before, we are engaged in the beginning of the end of patriarchy. Did any of us believe that such a battle would be won without resistance? Did any of us believe there would be no more bumps in the road? Did any of us foresee smooth sailing into the future?

We still have countless allies. We are not engaged in this struggle alone. There are countless heterosexual members of this Church who now “get it.” They have heard our stories, felt our pain and taken up our cause as their own. There are countless heterosexual families who have joined The Episcopal Church (they are numerous in my own diocese) because they want to raise their children in such an inclusive Church. There are countless lgbt people who have come to our churches for the comfort and solace and grounding in Christ that we offer – and we dare not lose hope or momentum for them as well as ourselves.

Most importantly, God is still with us. And by “us,” I don’t just mean gay and lesbian people. God is still with God’s Church – frail, cowardly and misguided as it can sometimes be, human nature being what it is. The Church is not ours to save or lose – the Church belongs to GOD, and the gates of Hell shall not prevail against it. I believe that we are meant to use the institution of the Church – yes, even boldy risk its existence – to further NOT our own agenda, but the agenda of God. I do not equate the two. Our vision of the Church is only partial; our grasp of what God wants is as susceptible to our self-focused distortion as anyone else’s. But we are called to witness to OUR vision of God’s will and combine it with all the other imperfect visions of God’s will (yes, even those of our detractors), and come up with as perfected a vision as we can muster. The Church has been wrangling over those different visions since its inception – and that will never change. The question for US, however, is: Will we continue to put forward faithfully and respectfully and tenaciously OUR vision into that mix, or will we be intimidated into doubting our own vision of God’s will for the Church – or worse still, leave?

God will continue to show forth God’s glory and God’s goodness in our lives. The reason that we have made progress with our brothers and sisters in the Church is that GOD has shown forth God’s glory and goodness in our lives so strongly, that God cannot be denied at work in us. Many of the faithful have changed their views on homosexuality because they see GOD showing up in our lives, our ministries, our relationships and our families. That is the witness we can and must continue to make to the Church – not pointing to ourselves, but to the God we know in our lives. As I have said before, and will continue to say: JESUS is our agenda – the saving sacrifice of Jesus Christ, who died on the cross for our sins, and the sins of the whole world, so that we might know God’s love and goodness in our lives. In the end, God will reign, and all will be well. I believe that with my whole heart.

Lastly, I give thanks every day to God for the fellowship we share. Part of what gives me relentless hope is my fellowship with YOU. What an honor and privilege it is to hold you in my heart as brothers and sisters in the faith, colleagues in ministry and faithful members of the Church. Can you imagine a more wonderful, fun and courageous group of “companions along the way?” Let our joy, our humor, our devotion to the Lord and to His Church be signs of the abundant life given to us in Christ. Let gay and lesbian people everywhere witness our joy, let them wonder how we can be so hopeful in the face of such overwhelming odds against us, that they want what we’ve got – a relationship with the living God that brings deep joy and abiding peace. Let us be ready to tell them the story of our own salvation at the hands of a loving God. And let us welcome them into our blessed fellowship, the Church.

I don’t know if this is the “word of hope” my friend asked for. It has little to do with events in Tanzania or even the Episcopal Church, and everything to do with God. But it is the hope that keeps me going. My faith is not in myself or in our “cause.” My faith is not in the House of Bishops or the General Convention to get it “right” anytime soon. It is, rather, the faith that people of countless generations and innumerable circumstances have found in our loving and trustworthy God. It is the faith Jesus said it was “blessed” to be persecuted for. It is the faith that Christians have always found in the life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ – and God’s desire, willingness and power to bring an Easter out of ANY Good Friday. It is the faith that in and through the Holy Spirit, God continues to fulfill God’s promise “to lead us into all truth.”

I may utterly fail; I will undoubtedly disappoint God in my inability to be the person God created me to be; I will predictably confuse my own will with God’s will. But whatever the next weeks, months and years may bring, whether the Episcopal Church “comes through” for us or not, GOD will not fail, GOD will never disappoint, and GOD will never cease to pursue God’s will for my life – and yours – and for the world.

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A Response to: A Season of Fasting: Reflections on the Primates Meeting, the Presiding Bishop’s message to the Church

FROM: The Rt. Rev. V. Gene Robinson, Bishop of New Hampshire

I have the utmost regard and respect for our new Presiding Bishop. Her leadership in these difficult times, not to mention her sheer courage, continues to inspire me.

As I vowed at her investiture as Presiding Bishop, I will do everything I can to support her in this ministry. That includes disagreeing with her views when I think it would build up the Body. What follows are my responses to those portions of her communication to the American Church dealing with the demands/threats made to The Episcopal Church related to those members of Christ’s Body who happen to be gay. Allow me to offer a different reading/critique of our Presiding Bishop’s words, and then propose a different way forward.

“What is being asked of both parties is a season of fasting – from authorizing rites for blessing same-sex unions and consecrating bishops in such unions on the one hand, and from transgressing traditional diocesan boundaries on the other.”

I am reminded of the joke about the chicken and the pig, each asked to contribute to breakfast – the chicken’s eggs require a significantly smaller sacrifice than the pig’s bacon! Let us be clear: what is being asked of both parties is “a season of fasting from” accepting the Church’s gay and lesbian people as full members of the Body of Christ, a season of fasting from “respecting the dignity of every human being.” If The Episcopal Church decides to do that, let’s call it what it is: a sacrifice borne most sacrificially by its gay and lesbian members.

[In citing the early church’s debate over dietary laws] “The needs of the weaker members, and the real possibility that their faith may be injured, are an important consideration in making the dietary decision.”

If there ARE “needs of the weaker members, and the real possibility that their faith may be injured,” they belong to the faithful members of the Church – in The Episcopal Church AND around the Anglican Communion – who are being denied full membership in the Body of Christ because of their same gender love. Is there even a single instance in which Jesus was willing to forego ministry, love and inclusion of the marginalized in order to protect the “sensitivities” of the Pharisees and Sadducees?! What would Jesus’ reaction have been to those same Pharisees and Sadducees if THEY had claimed to be the victims of Jesus’ insensitivity?“

The current controversy brings a desire for justice on the one hand into apparent conflict with a desire for fidelity to a strict understanding of the biblical tradition and to the main stream of the ethical tradition. Either party may be understood to be the meat-eaters, and each is reminded that their single-minded desire may be an idol. Either party might constructively also be understood by the other as the weaker member, whose sensibilities need to be considered and respected.”

There are MORE than TWO parties here. I would maintain that NEITHER the Episcopal Church NOR the vast majority of the Churches represented by the Primates are the “weaker members.” Rather I would say that the “weaker members” are those gay and lesbian members of the Church of Nigeria, whose Church is supporting the criminalization of all association between them in their country. The “weaker members” are the gay and lesbian members of the Episcopal Church, who have to go looking – sometimes in vain – for a congregation who will accept them as full members of the Body of Christ. The stronger/weaker dichotomy is NOT between The Episcopal Church and the rest of the Anglican Communion, but between the Anglican Communion in all its manifestations and the gay and lesbian Christians around the world trying to find a place within it. For the first time in its history, and at the hands of the larger Communion, The Episcopal Church may be experiencing a little taste of the irrational discrimination and exclusion that is an everyday experience of its gay and lesbian members.

“Each party in this conflict is asked to consider the good faith of the other, to consider that the weakness or sensitivity of the other is of significant import, and therefore to fast, or ‘refrain from eating meat,’ for a season. Each is asked to discipline itself for the sake of the greater whole, and the mission that is only possible when the community maintains its integrity.”

I certainly believe Paul when he says that no part of the Body can say to another, “I don’t need you.” On the other hand, I don’t ever recall Jesus saying that the “greater whole” is the be all and end all. Doesn’t Jesus challenge the greater whole to sacrifice itself for those on the margins? Preaching good news to the poor, binding up the broken hearted, releasing the prisoners and proclaiming the year of the Lord’s favor involves SACRIFICE on the part of the greater whole. That’s part of what angered his own hometown synagogue when he preached these powerful words from Isaiah. Touching the leper required SACRIFICE of ancient and firmly held beliefs. Eating with sinners was a SACRIFICE of the greater whole’s sensitivities. I would humbly submit that such sacrifice is the only way that our “community maintains its integrity.”

“Justice, (steadfast) love, and mercy always go together in our biblical tradition. None is complete without the others. While those who seek full inclusion for gay and lesbian Christians, and the equal valuing of their gifts for ministry, do so out of an undeniable passion for justice, others seek a fidelity to the tradition that cannot understand or countenance the violation of what that tradition says about sexual ethics. Each is being asked to forbear for a season.”

Where is the “justice, (steadfast) love, and mercy” for the Church’s gay and lesbian people in this threat from the primates? While the vast majority of the Anglican Communion AND the vast majority of Episcopalians may be willing to “forbear for a season,” the world’s gay and lesbian Anglicans long to hear the words spoken to Jesus at his baptism: “You are my beloved. In you I am well pleased.” Who will speak those words to them, while the rest of the Church forbears for a season? How will we explain this “forbearance” to all those gay and lesbian Christians who have come to The Episcopal Church because, for the first time ever, they have believed that there is a place for them AT God’s table, not simply BENEATH it, hoping for fallen scraps? Are THEIR souls not worthy of salvation too? Does anyone relish the notion of trying to explain all this “forbearance” to GOD?

Allow me to offer an additional reading of scriptural references to “fasting.” In addition to St. Paul's “pastoral” fasting, should we not also consider Isaiah’s notion of “prophetic” fasting?

4Look, you fast only to quarrel and to fight and to strike with a wicked fist.Such fasting as you do today will not make your voice heard on high.6Is not this the fast that I choose: to loose the bonds of injustice, to undo the thongs of the yoke,to let the oppressed go free, and to break every yoke? 7Is it not to share your bread with the hungry, and bring the homeless poor into your house;when you see the naked, to cover them, and not to hide yourself from your own kin? (Isaiah 58: 4, 6-7, NRSV)

Fasting that focuses only on the self is not, in Isaiah’s mind, the most pleasing to God. For the past many months, the Episcopal Church and the Anglican Communion has spent far too much time and money and focus on this debate. I believe that the majority of us – certainly in The Episcopal Church, and possibly in the Anglican Communion as well – want to set this aside and get on with the work of the Gospel. What would it be like if we fasted in the way that God, through Isaiah, suggests: to fast from our internal squabbling for a season, and turn our focus to the world’s homeless, hungry and poor, in this and every land? What if we focused on what we say is our top priority – ministry to a world in pain through the achievement of the Millennium Development Goals – and simply fasted from this self-focus?

The changes in our polity proposed by the Primates can only properly and canonically be responded to by the laity, clergy and bishops gathered in General Convention in 2009. The Primates’ demands can be seriously, prayerfully and thoughtfully considered at that time. What if we stated, simply and calmly, that the Primates’ September deadline is impossible under our polity, and pledge ourselves to feeding, housing, and clothing the poor and binding up the physical and spiritual wounds of the world’s neediest for this season, until 2009? What if we gave up our internal squabbling for a season, took no precipitous action, and turned our focus to the world that Jesus Christ gave his life for?

This way forward may not be acceptable to many in the Communion who want this settled now, once and for all. So be it. Nothing we do will settle this once and for all. Does anyone believe that our full compliance with the Primates’ demands, our complete denunciation of our gay and lesbian members, or my removal as bishop would make all this go away?! We cannot determine what the response to our actions will be. We can only decide what our faithful response will be to the demands made of us.

If the response of the Archbishop of Canterbury to our prophetic fasting should result in our not being invited to the Lambeth Conference, then let us offer that denial as part of our fasting. Let us dedicate the diocesan and personal resources that would have been spent on Lambeth to projects involved in furthering the Millennium Development Goals.

During the debate over the consent to my election, I am told that the Bishop of Wyoming noted that not since the civil rights movement of the 60’s had he seen the Church risk its life for something. Indeed, I think he is right. This is such a time. A brief quotation hangs on the wall of my office: “Courage is fear that has said its prayers.” Now is the time for courage, not fear.

I pray that in the days ahead, as the Executive Council meets in Portland, the House of Bishops meets in Texas, and the General Convention (the ONLY body which has the authority to respond to the demanded changes in our polity) meets in 2009, that we contemplate our call to “proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor” to those who have been denied it for so long and commit ourselves to the kind of fast that is pleasing to the Lord.