A Pastoral Letter from the Bishop of Central Florida

For an abstract reality - 815 can sure throw a punch.

This language is hugely significant.  Certainly it suggests that the Archbishop can contemplate a situation where only certain of the U.S. dioceses are in fact in communion.  This doesn’t mean he will recognize another province, or endorse—even then—cross-diocese incursions (although perhaps it does: if the diocese is not in communion, what’s the harm?).  It does suggest he wouldn’t endorse such incursions when done within Windsor-compliant dioceses such as Central Florida.  On the down side, I wonder if this suggests that he thinks (or is willing to pretend that) there are more compliant dioceses than there actually are. That said, the language is brilliant to use in any 815 legal action against dioceses and parishes (in Windsor compliant dioceses), as the Archbishop himself now terms the national church but an “abstract reality.”  That also undermines the notion of a hierarchical church, as least beyond the diocesan level.

It is a recipe for complete confusion.  How can you say that recognize the hands as being OK when the brain has cancer?

It is people who wish to maintain the status quo no matter what.  There is a phrase in business:  “Creative destruction”.  It means you take down the structures that aren’t working to start over, and it happens all the time.

It needs to happen here.

Well, it’s not clear—that’s for sure—but if the Archbishop wants to avoid pressure to recognize another province, or endorse “incursions,” and keep the Communion intact, this is one way he might try to do it.  This doesn’t keep dioceses from leaving, interestingly—so Bps Iker, Duncan, Ackerman, etc., could leave with their dioceses and stay in Communion.  815 will be alarmed by this sort of language.  What’s interesting (not knowing the context) is why with emphasis on bishops and dioceses—and relegation to abstraction of the national church—why Bp Howe still genuflects toward 815 in this letter.  But one thing that is really interesting is the possibility that the national church could be deemed out of communion by Canterbury, while the constituent dioceses might remain in communion.  Talk about cognitive dissonance.

Bishops, yes, central provincial “politburo,” no. Very interesting indeed!

How can you say that recognize the hands as being OK when the brain has cancer?

But what the Archbishop seems to be saying is that 815 is not the real brain for the dioceses held under it. Does this also mean that ties between any two dioceses, even if from two different provinces, have greater meaning than one would have thought before this point?

All very nice, but then KJS and De Beers will cast their 5000 votes and do their thing, probably in a secular US court.  The we will see who has the superior authoriety. batten down the hatches.  Limber the guns.

the Bishop and the Diocese as the primary locus of ecclesial identity rather than the abstract reality of the ‘National Church.’”

When I first read +Howe’s letter, I misunderstood this language, thinking it was Howe’s, not Williams’.  I put in a comment on the other thread last night that is erroneous now that I understand (I think) who said what.

The ABC is certainly doing the “National Church” no favors in the upcoming litigation by saying the diocese is the real entity and the national church (ECUSA) is an “abstract reality.”  I am starting to belabor this point, but it bears repeating.  There are two legal questions that will be decisive in litigation between 815 and entire dioceses such as Ft. Worth and Pittsburgh: (1) will the court apply neutral principles of law or defer to an ecclesiastical hierarchy; and (2) if the latter, who is the hierarch.  Rowan Williams’ voice is not the final authority, of course, in US litigation, but he just answered the second of these questions in a way most unhelpful to the national church.

“Any Diocese compliant with Windsor remains clearly in communion with Canterbury and the mainstream of the Communion, whatever may be the longer-term result for others in The Episcopal Church. The organ of union with the wider Church is the Bishop and the Diocese rather than the Provincial structure as such…. I should feel a great deal happier, I must say, if those who are most eloquent for a traditionalist view in the United States showed a fuller understanding of the need to regard the Bishop and the Diocese as the primary locus of ecclesial identity rather than the abstract reality of the ‘National Church.’”

Uh??? Translation please? I mean could one be more confusing in their speaking?

ODC—Translation: TEC may be tossed out of the Communion as a Province, but Windsor dioceses may remain.  This is the best possible outcome for the orthodox; I find this statement by the ABC wildly encouraging.  For more background analysis, see <a >here</a> and <a >here</a>.

There are at least four diocese that recognize the bishop as the primary locus of ecclesial identity and authority.  And I thank God daily that I reside in one of them.  It seems that the ABC just handed 815 a very unpleasant “bone”.  It will be interesting to watch KJS and DBB run with the fact that Windsor compliant diocese are in communion with Cantarbury while it sounds like others in TEC may not be.  I’ll bet that scorches KJS and the HOB.  CCP is beginning to look better and better.

Well, this may be good news for the dioceses that may leave.  But I’m not so sure it’s good news for parishes in Windsor-compliant dioceses.  If, for example, Bp Howe is in Communion with Canterbury and the Anglican Communion, is there any justification for incursions?  And if not, and the bishop is the key person, are those within his geographical diocese in fact not out of communion with Canterbury when they depart?  This might not be the same with parishes in non-Windsor dioceses, and there their link via an off-shore primate might connect them.  The real issue is what is a Windsor-compliant diocese, and here there may be a huge difference between what we think is one and what the ABC is willing to think of as one.  Chane, Andrus, Shaw, Bruno—sure, they’re pretty clearly not.  But what about Howard?  Parsley?  etc.?  And there’s nothing here saying that the ABC is thinking of ejecting the non-Windsors—he’s just saying that whatever happens folks like Howe and his flock are safely within the Anglican Communion and in communion with him.

I should feel a great deal happier, I must say, if those who are most eloquent for a traditionalist view in the United States showed a fuller understanding of the need to regard the Bishop and the Diocese as the primary locus of ecclesial identity ...

Surely the Diocese of Virginia is Windsor Compliant. In part ABC is waging his finger at foreign border crossings by several foreign provinces (CANA et al.) into the DoV.

In the copy of the letter at
http://1episcopalvoice.blogspot.com/2007/10/bishop-speaks-heres-bishop-john-howes.html
the direct quote from the archbishop ends after the word “such”.  Thus:

“Any Diocese compliant with Windsor remains clearly in communion with Canterbury and the mainstream of the Communion, whatever may be the longer-term result for others in The Episcopal Church. The organ of union with the wider Church is the Bishop and the Diocese rather than the Provincial structure as such.”

It would seem desirable to get the quote right before building too much on it…

This alternative version of the letter

http://1episcopalvoice.blogspot.com/2007/10/bishop-speaks-heres-bishop-john-howes.html

puts the close quote much earlier. It has Howe saying abstract reality.

Which is correct?

More meaningless words, both from Bishop Howe and Rowan Williams.
The lawsuits will procede. (What kind of pastoral care will Howe provide to those having their properties conviscated by 815??)  The faithful will continue to depart for true godly leadership provided by the Global South.  Rowan Williams will continue to do nothing while those with a clear agenda to remove the Anglican Communion from the body of Christ procede in his full view, endorsed by his inaction.  These truly are the sadest of times.
Lord have mercy, Christ have mercy, Lord have mercy.

Depending on where the quote ends, I stand by my comment of last night or of today.  At least one of them has to be right.

The statement from Williams raises questions but is of course significant. Williams made a commitment to the orthodox dioceses several years ago (remember Bp Duncan’s frustration about this a few months ago) to be patient and stay put and he would not abandon them. This excerpt suggests he is a man of his word.

This excerpt suggests he is a man of his word.

Reason and Revelation,
You more trust in him than I would. His actions have not shown to be be one yet. And for me actions speak much louder than words….words are just that Words

There really isn’t much new here, aside from possible phraseological nuances such as

if those who are most eloquent for a traditionalist view in the United States showed a fuller understanding of the need to regard the Bishop and the Diocese as the primary locus of ecclesial identity rather than the abstract reality of the ‘National Church.

BettyLee is correct in her assessment.  The orthodox have been and are being steamrolled, big time! Bishop Howe or any other orthodox clergy in the entire AC, tell us all RIGHT NOW—RIGHT NOW where BettyLee and I and thousands of others are to hold any hope whatsoever in a hyper-institutionalist, power-mad, wayward, faith-forsaking TEC?? I double dog dare you!! 

To borrow what Bishop Iker said, There is no future in TEC as currently constituted. None.  Period.  Prove me wrong!  Anyone going to pick up this gauntlet??  Do you have the wherewithal to answer?  I’m not waiting anymore.  You are being called out to respond!  Now to my blood pressure pills…

Kyrie eleison!

For those of you not following the discussion at T19, Kendall Harmon has posted the following comment:

I have a copy of the original as mailed to diocesan leadership and it has the full quote—or the longer quote—in quotation marks. It is worth trying to track this down further, I think, before anyone draws conclusions.

http://www.kendallharmon.net/t19/index.php/t19/article/7031/#132593

All orthodox Anglicans in the US (or anywhere in the world) meet me in the pumpkin patch—it’s that time of year, after all—and we will wait with Linus for the Great Pumpkin to appear (or for Rowan Williams to do one thing for the orthodox in the US (or anywhere in the Anglican Communion), whichever comes first. 
Grace, peace and eternal hope in Christ Jesus and thanks be to God for all those who choose to follow Him.

Betty Lee and Athanasius—

The sentence quoted is open to an alternative interpretation, which I think is more consonant with the entire quotation from the ABC—“I wish that traditionalists would understand that there is no need to disaffiliate themselves from TEC if they are in a Windsor diocese, since it is the bishop and diocese, not the ‘National Church,’ that is their primary locus of ecclesial identity.”

I believe that his point here is that if TEC is ejected from the Communion but Windsor dioceses remain—under whatever sort of umbrella—the status of, say, the California or Connecticut parishes that have seceded from unfaithful dioceses and affiliated with the CCP is relatively straighforward, but those that have left Windsor dioceses pose an ecclesiological problem that will take complex negotiations to straighten out.

If my interpretation is correct, this is one of the most hopeful statements yet from +++Rowan—who has by now had time to study at least some of the responses from the Primates he asked for several weeks ago.

The ellipsis doesn’t make any sense unless the quotation continues beyond “such.”

R and R writes, “This excerpt suggests he is a man of his word.” No, he is a man of words (and more words and still more words…).”

As I said, my dear brother, Craig, meet me in the pumpkin patch.
There is always hope because nothing is impossible with God.
I never had the blessing of a faithful bishop in TEC (since my childhood, that is), so I don’t have any idea how that would feel.  Thanks be to God I have one now, outside of TEC.  For those who know their TEC bishops are faithful, continue to pray for God to speak clearly to them about how they will take care of, love and feed His sheep, for they and each one of us will have to answer for the choices we are making at this extremely difficult time.  May God be merciful to all of us.

I believe that his point here is that if TEC is ejected from the Communion but Windsor dioceses remain—under whatever sort of umbrella—the status of, say, the California or Connecticut parishes that have seceded from unfaithful dioceses and affiliated with the CCP is relatively straighforward, but those that have left Windsor dioceses pose an ecclesiological problem that will take complex negotiations to straighten out.

Thank you, Craig.

A so-called Windsor diocese would remain such only under a Windsor bishop, and some Windsor bishops are nearing retirement. TEC apparatus being as it is, these bishoprics would be under fire even more, and when new elections are to be held in such, well, let’s just say South Carolina and leave it at that.  To top it off, Windsor has been shown to be of no effect.  Is it somehow to be resurrected and made potent?

I reiterate my call:

Bishop Howe or any other orthodox clergy in the entire AC, tell us all RIGHT NOW—RIGHT NOW where BettyLee and I and thousands of others are to hold any hope whatsoever in a hyper-institutionalist, power-mad, wayward, faith-forsaking TEC??

This is, indeed, significant, and it is a great reason to be a member of a Windsor diocese.  With that in mind, I can well remember Bishop Dan Herzog saying, after returning from a Province II meeting, that he was the only diocesan bishop in the Province in communion with the whole Anglican Communion—specifically because of the Windsor action of himself and the diocese.  I am glad to see that it has not changed.

And several bishops have said in my hearing that because the PB is not an Archbishop and a primate in the specific sense there is no intermediate level between the diocesan bishops in ECUSA and the ABC.  Yes, this differentiates ECUSA polity from other provinces, and right now it is a good thing.  The PB presides at the HOB and at 815—that’s all. 

Do keep clear that in 1789 it was the dioceses meeting in convention that created ECUSA, and the straightforward role of the PB was that the senior bishop presided at their meeting—- and then went back home to his own diocese to work the ministry invested in him.

Usually the ... means that something has been omitted from a quote.  We all would love to see the whole letter from the +ABC.  We all would love to know what is what without all of the politics.

However, thank you, Bishop Howe, for this letter.  We asked our priest to know where you stand with Jesus - that we need to hear it from you.  You answered that in this letter.  Transparency is needed.  Please, please don’t do lawsuits - and please don’t let 815 talk you into them. 

May we all hear God’s voice loudly and clearly, and then follow HIS will.

“I should feel a great deal happier, I must say, if those who are most eloquent for a traditionalist view in the United States showed a fuller understanding of the need to regard the Bishop and the Diocese as the primary locus of ecclesial identity rather than the abstract reality of the ‘National Church.’”

This is the same idea I heard preached by my former “Windsor” bishop - in effect, “I am the top of the food chain, pay no attention to those heretics at 815.”  And for a while, I bought that.  But finally, it was clear that 815, though only an abstract political entity, was indeed, a Very Big Problem.  The unconditional accession clause in diocesan constitutions is only one of the places where 815 demands fealty.  When an “abstract reality” can sue your butt to the wall, it becomes a Functional Reality.  When they can sign onto the letterhead of a pro-abortion lobbying group in the name of the whole church without even asking the body, then they are unaccountable and Out of Control.  When they violate their own canons and mandates from previous General Conventions (may they rot in dark places) then they have lost the right to even be trusted, let alone bowed to.

+++Williams may think he finally “gets” TEC Polity with bishops at the top of the heirarchical flow chart.  But he does not understand that here, the reality of “living in tension” means that sometimes the bishop is the top of the food chain, and sometimes he is only a vassal in service to The Machine.  The logical shift for my orthodox parish, striving for theological integrity all the way up to the functional head of the food chain, meant a lateral move (inter-Communion) away from The Machine entirely.

I think that we can speculate all we want about what is or isn’t being implied here by the ABofC. But in the end he and KJS will say it meant something entirely different. Again let me say….Words are just words, actions from the ABofC would speak much louder and clearer and be more believeable.

NOTE: I have deleted the words “corrected text” from both the headline and the body of this post.

The reason is that our morning post of this interesting letter had the correct quote from the ABC in entirety. 

The incorrect quote from the ABC was posted at some other blogs, but not StandFirm.  Of course, we’ve made our share of errors—but this one we did not make.  The quote from the ABC was the full complete one this morning [at least, as it is quoted in Howe’s letter] and was in the letter which we posted this morning.  Why it appeared in its shortened form on other blogs is a mystery.

I will also add the above comment in the post so that we can track what has happened.

<a >Athanasius</a>—
What difference would TEC’s preferences for the next bishop make, since under this scenario TEC has no canonical standing within the Windsor group?

Craig Goodrich wrote Translation:

TEC may be tossed out of the Communion as a Province, but Windsor dioceses may remain.  This is the best possible outcome for the orthodox; I find this statement by the ABC wildly encouraging.

and

I believe that his point here is that if TEC is ejected from the Communion but Windsor dioceses remain—under whatever sort of umbrella—the status of, say, the California or Connecticut parishes that have seceded from unfaithful dioceses and affiliated with the CCP is relatively straighforward, but those that have left Windsor dioceses pose an ecclesiological problem…

I agree that if the ABC means what you think he means, it’s very encouraging for Windsor-compliant dioceses, but I wish I knew where this leaves individual Windsor parishes in non-Windsor dioceses and individual orthodox Episcopalians in probably-not-leaving-TEC parishes in such dioceses.

Will there be a way for such a parish or person to remain in communion with Anglicanism worldwide when/if TEC, except Windsor dioceses, is declared out of communion? I hope somebody somewhere is thinking about a mechanism that will make this possible.

From kyounge1956: “Will there be a way for such a parish or person to remain in communion with Anglicanism worldwide when/if TEC, except Windsor dioceses, is declared out of communion? I hope somebody somewhere is thinking about a mechanism that will make this possible.”
This really is a key question.  Many people have affiliated with international Anglican churches TEMPORARILY (as all sides have said) while awaiting a way forward.  Such parishes are now established but apparently have “missionary” status at present: how can they remain reasonably intact but claim full Anglican identity if the Windsor-compliant Episcopal dioceses receive authority?  Or how can an individual in a non-compliant diocese join a Windsor diocese?  How can an individual in a “missionary” church be part of a Windsor diocese?

How people forget.

Please remember the ABC’s exact words leading up to, and at, the HOB meeting, and the conclusions of the JSC, ACC and his Task Force that TEC, that is as a national church, is compliant with Windsor.

The ABC’s first priority at this stage, like Howe’s, is to avoid TEC being kicked out of the Communion and for further defections from TEC.  This letter is part of that strategy.  I am sure that Howe is using the letter to keep the seven parishes from becoming twelve or more.

The only good news here is that Howe seems to be willing to let the departing parishes buy their property if there is not a significant enough “continuing” parish to make a go of it on the property (20-%?). That was, of course, precisely the hoped for outcome of the defunct Virginia protocol.  This will end the same way, once Howe+ is engaged by Beers, et al in “consultations”.

“I should feel a great deal happier, I must say, if those who are most eloquent for a traditionalist view in the United States showed a fuller understanding of the need to regard the Bishop and the Diocese as the primary locus of ecclesial identity rather than the abstract reality of the ‘National Church”.

Craig G. is spot-on.  The AB of C is saying that he does not understand why, and it may not help the international ecclesial solution, churches like the seven above and CC Plano are pulling out when they’ve already got an orthodox bishop. 

I understand their need to follow their conscience, but I’ve got that same question myself, Your Grace.  Doing the work of the Church under a bishop like Stanton is surely most different from attempting to do the same work under a “bishop” like Shaw.  The orthodox in places like DioMass surely have no other option than to get out.  As a lay person, had I not been able to relocate, I would have gotten out a long time ago.  If you want Christ in DioMass or DioNH, get thyself to Kenya, otherwise all you’ll get is the two-faced, backstabbing advancement of the gay agenda at detrimental cost to all. 

“Surely the Diocese of Virginia is Windsor Compliant”.

Watch their hands, not their lips.  It’s my understanding that SSB’s have gone on for years in that diocese, with PJL turning a blind eye to it despite his diocesan policies.  Perhaps someone like BabyBlue or Clancy Nixon+ could write in from a more accurate perspective than my own.  That diocese’s last convention did pass a resolution to start “studying” blessings, too.  “Studying”...yeah, I’ll bet. 

“The PB presides at the HOB and at 815—that’s all”.

No, that’s not entirely true.  I live for the day when the current Deist(i.e., Christian MIA or nonexistent) is surely not my representative on the world Anglican stage at the primates’ meetings.  The only reason I live with it now is because Bishop Duncan and co. defended our Christian interests at the last primates’ meeting, and the Global South primates understand exactly what’s going on here. 

Now, let’s review: 

“Any Diocese compliant with Windsor remains clearly in communion with Canterbury and the mainstream of the Communion, whatever may be the longer-term result for others in The Episcopal Church. The organ of union with the wider Church is the Bishop and the Diocese rather than the Provincial structure as such…. I should feel a great deal happier, I must say, if those who are most eloquent for a traditionalist view in the United States showed a fuller understanding of the need to regard the Bishop and the Diocese as the primary locus of ecclesial identity rather than the abstract reality of the ‘National Church.’”

This is such pretty polite British-speak, but, were I the goons at 815, I’d be having a small cow over “whatever may be the longer-term result for others in TEC” and “the abstract reality of the ‘National Church’”. 

So, I await the “longer-term result”, and, were I 815, I would be just a little wary of a man with the reputation of the patience of a saint, who has now engaged in his own brand of name-calling, probably rightfully.

I’m hangin’ out with all attention, THANK GOD, in a traditional diocese, but I pray for persecuted Christians everywhere….

IC,

The Geek

If we try to put together carefully what everyone has said, including +Duncan’s comments about diocesan geographical limitations being loosened, it would appear that loose orthodox parishes (loose from their geographical TEC diocese, I mean, of course…) would eventually come under one of the Network or Windsor bishops rather than an overseas prelate.  Once the structural outline of the Communion’s solution to the problem is clear, and 815’s legal and canonical clout vaporized, the individual parishes’ preferences can be negotiated in an unhurried Christian atmosphere.

By and large, if you look at the reasons given by parishes that seceded from Windsor dioceses, the primary concerns were a) financial support to an apostate 815 bureaucracy, and b) [probably more important] the near-impossibility of ordinary missionary work in their community when the (accurate) image presented by the newspapers and mass media is of a gay-obsessed church about to be tossed out of its international Communion. 

This concern with the image of the denomination is inevitable in the US, where we have sort of a “brand-name” market in churches; we all know about Presbyterians and Lutherans, for example, but few outside the respective churches know anything specific about the local presbytery or synod.  Likewise I doubt that many outsiders are aware of the theological differences between dioceses that are so crucial to us.

This is not the case in England, of course, what with establishment and all, so the ABC’s peckishness is understandable.  But again, once the Communion has decided on the overall outline, the details will take care of themselves over time.

the abstract reality of the ‘National Church.

My, oh my, aren’t we making a lot of presuppositions about this phrase and some other bits of the ABC’s missive to Howe?

Abstract?  Yes, but…  Look at the Dennis Canon.  The abstraction has some teeth.
Reality?  Yes.  In other words, it’s (TEC) what we have to deal with.

Is ABC trying to make a point?  Yes, but what is it really?  Bishops and dioceses are the locus of an episcopal identity, eh.  With apologies, Your Grace, no duh!

Don’t hold your breaths, all y’all.  Until actions issue from ++Howe and +++Williams, there’s not too terribly much here to get in an uproar about.  Keep your powder dry.

Once the structural outline of the Communion’s solution to the problem is clear, and 815’s legal and canonical clout vaporized,

Likelihood of either?
When?

Craig Goodrich wrote:

Once the structural outline of the Communion’s solution to the problem is clear, and 815’s legal and canonical clout vaporized, the individual parishes’ preferences can be negotiated in an unhurried Christian atmosphere.

I’m not a lawyer, so I don’t understand why TEC’s legal clout would be vaporized, whatever solution the Communion comes up with. Would US judges take any account of actions by overseas religious leaders? Maybe one of Stand Firm’s legal eagles knows if there is a precedent in US court cases—for example a dispute about ownership of a church property when the clergy person in charge is excommunicated by their denomination, either a national body or a regional one analagous to a diocese?

Won’t TEC just argue, “our canons say we own all the buildings, and the canon was in effect before the split, and none of those guys (ABC or Primates) have any authority on this continent, and the bishops are in breach of our canons even if they are recognized by overseas bodies, so we still own the property and the congregation occupying it are trespassing”?

“I’m not a lawyer, so I don’t understand why TEC’s legal clout would be vaporized, whatever solution the Communion comes up with”.

I know the answer to this, but one of the actual lawyers would have to weigh in with the proper terminology…perhaps Brad Drell is “listening”? 

If the Communion powers-that-be were to declare that TEC is “out of Communion” with the See of Canterbury, or if TEC declares that it “walks apart”(I doubt it would do this, though, because it loses too much face), then TEC stands in violation of its own Charter(”...in Communion with the See of Canterbury”), the denomination is technically divided, which significantly reduces any of TEC’s claims on the property.  State laws, of course, also play into this, but a denomination officially divided seriously undercuts TEC’s legal case. 

Idiots that play for all the marbles tend to lose and get their butts kicked.  Compromise is usually the name of the successful game, and the primates gave TEC that chance with the DES Communique.  Instead, arrogance prevailed and TEC is probably only just starting to realize that it can’t litigate parishes and people in every diocese(not to mention WHOLE dioceses).  But, it looks like there’s still effort to have their cake and eat it, too.  Good luck—that’s an utter fool’s game.  Not to mention that it, along with sodomy and all the other pagan perversions driving this bus, DOES NOT look AT ALL like the vision of God. 

Just how much more wrong can this agenda look?  It slices and dices the denomination and drives people out of the pews.  And that’s “prophetic”? 

Al Gore has previously had one statement right: 

“Get with the g.d. program”....

God help us all—

The G.

I should feel a great deal happier, I must say, if those who are most eloquent for a traditionalist view in the United States showed a fuller understanding of the need to regard the Bishop and the Diocese as the primary locus of ecclesial identity rather than the abstract reality of the ‘National Church.’”

++Rowan,

Perhaps we would if we so often had not been betrayed by “Windsor Bishops” who folded like cheap card tables at the slightest wisper from 815.  I they had stood up to and said NO to +VGR, we might be willing to wait.  If the had stood up for Christ when 815’s High Priestess had pronounced him as “a” vehicle to the divine, then we might look to another path.  If the had called her on the version of the truth she chose to tell about her agreement to the DES Communique rather than praising her leadership, then might we trust.

The fact is that you ++Rowan have twice floated trial ballons to clear TEC, the sub group report at DEs and now the JSC report on the Hob meeting.  Why in the world should we trust you to stand up for the orthodox anglican here in America.

You fought for a few weeks against a Labour government over Catholic adoptions and lost.  We fight the same fight everyday against our church’s Supreme Soviet.  We, like WSC, will never give up, for the price of that is ceeding anglicalism to the devil.  If we have to have our own Dunkirk then so be, but we cannot loose, because the stakes are too high.

I ask you sir, help us to stamp out the heresy before it spreads too far.

RSB

It was claimed:

Surely the Diocese of Virginia is Windsor Compliant. In part ABC is waging his finger at foreign border crossings by several foreign provinces (CANA et al.) into the DoV.

Why do you say that?  Lee of Virginia voted for Gene Robinson.  He voted for the non-answer in New Orleans.  He has knowingly permitted SSBs to occur in his diocese without repercussion.  (His actions with respect to VTS are reported elsewhere on this blog).  He has declared that priests going to oversight with other provinces have abandoned communion with him - not that they have disobeyed him (of course, we know that this was to avoid an ecclesiastical trial, but it still means that Lee has declared the Diocese of Virginia, and by extension TEC, out of communion with several African provinces).

If Lee is a Windsor bishop, then all TEC bishops are Windsor bishops.  Now, you might argue that Williams intends to find that that is the case.  But inasmuch as this was written to Howe, I think you may assume too much to think that it would cover Lee.  Perhaps you should explain why you think so.