March 11, 2009 at 3:30 pm
I afraid this post is an example of the kind of extreme rhetoric which is disrespectful of our Primate and our Bishops. There has been all too much of this during the current debate. If the poster thinks the church leadership is apostate, he doesn’t know what he is talking about. These are faithful servants of Christ and the church trying their best to deal sensitively with difficult issues at a difficult time.
The writer thinks no motion should have even gone forward on blessing of same sex unions because scripture clearly has spoken. The writer should know many of us believe scripture has not spoken in the way he thinks. Instead we believe that it is selective literalism of the kind that the Anglican Church has never embraced which brings about such an extreme position.
Those of us who remain in the Anglican Church of Canada are followers of Christ and believers in the word. We celebrate the Eucharist Sunday by Sunday, preach the Gospel, care for the sick, study the Bible. How dare Frank W. judge us all and declare those faithful Bishops, clergy and lay people who remain in the church as apostate.
Property matters have nothing to do with greed. The churches have been built and maintained for years by faithful Anglicans. They don’t deserve to be taken by literalist/fundamentalists who have little grasp of our Anglican tradition of diversity and tolerance. The pattern of parishes leaving and trying to keep the building seems to rely completely on having a literalist/fundamentalist incumbent who has conditioned the people with many years of anti-Anglican rhetoric.
Comment caught in Limbo:
Your comment is awaiting moderation.
March 12, 2009 at 10:18 pm
Bob, with all due respect, I find that your use of the literalist/fundamentalist “nom de terror” is precisely the kind of “extreme rhetoric” which you say is disrepectful.
I tend to think that there is a third option, perhaps best articulated by John Howard Yoder: “I have been called both “fundamentalist” and “pietist” by unsympathetic readers, since they put me in an already-closed slot in their minds, to which they had relegated the use of the Bible. They did not read me carefully enough to be aware that my reading of the scriptural texts was post- and not pre- critical.”
John Howard Yoder: “The Politics of Jesus Revisited” (1997)
Perhaps my comment did not meet the suggested criterion:
If so, then I heartily apologize.
If, however, the problem seems to be that after 5 days no one at head office can decide whether or not the suggestion that there is a post-critical reading of the text which is neither literalist nor fundamentalist can be posted publicly, well, then, my work is done here.
Or just beginning.
(I wonder if the literalists/fundamentalists are people like this,(BA,MA,MRel,ThD) who also seem to be this.)
I made a couple of comments that were held in moderation, too. They are gone altogether, now. Odd, since they were quite polite.
Funnily enough, a pingback to my blog sits unmolested in one of the comments.
Posted by: David | March 20, 2009 at 06:45 AM
Gee what a surprise mine are in Never-Never Land. The fact that I pick a Bob Bettson and the ACoC has nothing to do with it. Surprisingly I have an old e-mail from Bob telling me how he never comments on the blogs or other peoples postings.
Most of the letters shown so far have been less than complimentary
Posted by: Steve L.- | March 20, 2009 at 10:04 AM
I'm going to try one more time, then I paln to write to the embassy and ask that they send a special envoy to press for the release of comments which have been held, without charge, in moderation for several days.
I also expect that the my comments being held in moderation have adequate access to food and water, as well as regular consultation with other comments also being held.
Posted by: joseph | March 20, 2009 at 11:04 AM