Week Ending 7/23/18

Conversations in South Carolina Reach Many

The Episcopal Church in South Carolina had three "conversations" last week hoping to get its message out to members of the congregations who have been participating in the schismatic diocese. Update carried the pre-meeting announcements here.  Mixed crowds of those participating in the Episcopal Church and of those from the schismatic groups filled each site.  The meetings were organized with opening statements, including a video message from the Presiding Bishop, and then a chance to circulate among 4 stations to get different kinds of questions answered.  Bishop Lawrence and the schismatic group pushed back by announcing a set of 5 meetings all being held at properties covered by the law suit and now officially owned by the Episcopalians.  Comments on this announcement from blogger Steve Skaradon are here.

Chile Moves Closer to Anglican Province Status

The consecration of two additional bishops for Chile and its division into four dioceses has moved Chile one step closer to becoming the 40th province of the Anglican Communion.  Chile has received permission to become a separate province from its current provincial home, the Province of South America and now await approval from the Anglican Consultative Council.  Should the ACC approve, Bishop Zavala will become the new province's primate and also shepherd one of the 4 dioceses.  His current assisting bishop will cover the 4th diocese.  Don't expect the new province to be a friend of the Episcopal Church. Zavala, who studied at Trinity School for Ministry,  served as Primate for the South American Province from 2010-2016. In 2010 his province was disciplined for Zavala's border crossing.  He has also sided with the schismatics in South Carolina, visiting that  group after the schism. More details on the process for approval as a province are in this article posted by the Episcopal Cafe.   

Path Forward Outlined by Three More Bishops

The response of the Communion Partner Bishops to passage Resolution B012 on marriage liturgies byGeneral Convention continues to take shape.  Update carried the first several statements issued last week.  Now another 3 bishops have weighed in, although one has not fully announced what he will do.  The Bishop of North Dakota has announced  priests or rectors in charge wishing to preside at a same-sex marriage should contact him so he can assigned pastoral oversight for the marriage.  He invoked the process outlined for DEPO as the way they would move forward, but his announcement suggests that DEPO would be very temporary and the option applies to priests-in-charge (which would include missions.  Bishop Bauerschmidt of Tennessee issued a letter that follows the letter and spirit of the resolution, saying that any priest who wished to preside at a single-sex marriage should contact him and he would provide the name of a bishop to counsel on that wedding. Bishop Love of Albany opposed B012 and has now issued a statement saying the resolution provides major conflicts with the diocesan canons.  He has called a conference of all clergy for September 6, 2018 to discuss the resolution, and that he wants to consult with the diocesan Standing Committee before making an further statements.

ACNA Picks Up Another Retired Bishop

The retired Bishop of the Yukon, Terry Buckle has resigned his membership in the Anglican Church of Canada and affiliated with the Anglican Network in Canada, which is a diocese of the Anglican Church of North America. He will be the 7th bishop affiliated with the diocese which spans all of Canada and also covers churches in Vermont and Massachusetts.  Buckle has long been prominent in conservative circles, facing charges at one point for taking 11 churches from the Diocese of New Westminster under his oversight without permission of the bishop of that diocese.

New Saints for Lesser Feasts and Fasts

General Convention had trouble agreeing on a finalized list of those Episcopalians would commemorate with special days in our liturgy.  The situation had gotten increasingly complex with different lists in the official Lesser Feasts and Fast and two later expansions, Holy Women, Holy Men (2012), and Great Cloud of Witnesses (2015).  The Standing Commission on Liturgy and Music had made a recommendation to convention of a single pared down and revised list and the Convention Committee on Prayer Book, Liturgy and Music had amended that list, but duplication of names resulted in the House of Deputies challenging authorization.  The result was continuation of Lesser Feast and Fasts (2006), the Great Cloud of Witnesses remains "available" and the new list prepared in 2018 for Lesser Feasts and Fasts is approved for trial use. [The Episcopal News Service has several details wrong.  The Update editor was at the General Convention sessions for the discussion and checked the official documents for this report.] The Standing Commission on Liturgy and Music is charged with coming in with a combined, final list in 2021.   None of that, however, stopped three names from being added to the official Lesser Feasts and Fasts. Two were African Americans and one Chinese, two were women (a priest and a deaconess) and one a layman. And Thus Pauli Murray (a poet, author, civil and women's rights advocate and the first African American Woman ordained priest), and Florence Li Tim Oi (a deaconess in Hong Kong who was ordained to the priesthood during World War II thus becoming the first woman priest in the Anglican Communion), and Thurgood Marshall (civil rights lawyer and first African American to serve on the U.S. Supreme Court) were added to lesser Feasts and Fasts.  Among those carried over from Great Cloud of Witnesses to the trial use calendar in Lesser Feasts and Fasts 2018 is Deaconess Anna Alexander, the only African American woman set apart as a deaconess in the Episcopal Church.  She served in rural Georgia for 53 years, forming and African American parish, a school and an orphanage.